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WITH THE ZIONI STS IN GALLIPOLI 
LIEUT. COL. J. H. PATTERSON, D.S.O. 




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THE llOLLOWKD HAND GIVES A VERY GOOD IDEA 
OF THE AVPEAKANCE OF THE COUNTRY 



WITH THE ZIONISTS 
IN GALLIPOLI 



BY 

LIEUT. COL. J. H. Patterson' D.s.o. 

Author of '*The Man-Eaters of Tsavo," 
**In The Grip of the Nvika," etc 



^ ILLUSTRATED 




NEW YORK 
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 



^^f 






Copyright, 1916, 
By George H. Doran Company yj 



y — 

I' ' 

PKINTED IV THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

JUN-6I9I6' 
©CI.A433275 ^ 



PREFACE 

The narrative of the Zionists in Gallipoli has 
been written during the enforced idleness of the 
past month — a month which has been spent in 
endeavouring to recover sufficient health and 
strength to enable me to take a further, and, I 
trust, a more useful, hand in the Great Drama 
now approaching its climax. 

In the following pages I have "set down nought 
in malice," neither have I given a word of praise 
where praise is not due — and more than due. My 
relations with those with whom I came into con- 
tact were excellent, and on the very rare occasions 
when they were otherwise, it was not due to any 
seeking of mine, but, unfortunately, my tempera- 
ment is not such that I can suffer fools gladly. 

My story is one of actual happenings, told just 
as I saw them with some suggestions thrown in, 
and if from these a hint is taken here and there 
by those in the "Seats of the Mighty," then so 
much the better for our Cause. 

My chief object in writing this book is to in- 
terest the Hebrew nation in the fortunes of the 
Zionists and show them of what their Russian 

[ V] 



PREFACE 

brothers are capable, even under the command 
of an alien in race and religion. Those who have 
the patience to follow me through these pages 
will, of coiu"se, see that I am not by any means an 
alien in sympathy and admiration for the people 
who have given to the world some of its greatest 
men, not to mention The ^lan who has so pro- 
foundly changed the world's outlook. 

London, 1916. 



[vi] 



CONTENTS 

CJIAPTER PAGE 

I Inteoduction 17 

II General Policy of the Dardanelles 

Campaign 32 

III Strategy and Tactics of the Darda- 

nelles Campaign 37 

IV Formation of the Zion Mule Corps 46 
V Arrival at Lemnos 62 

VI A Strenuous Night 72 

VII Description of Southern Gallipoli 85 

VIII A Homeric Conflict 89 

IX The Zion Mule Corps Land in Gal- 
lipoli 106 

X A Night up the Gully Ravine . . 120 

XI How Zion Mules Upset Turkish 

Plans 127 

XII Life in Our New Camp .... 136 

XIII A May Battle 147 

XIV General d'Amade and the Corps Ex- 

PEDITIONNAIRE d'OrIENT . . . 154 

XV Various Bombardments . . . .159 

XVI The Coming of the German Subma- 
rines .,. 166 

XVII Trench Warfare in Gallipoli . . 170 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

XVIII Guns and Staff 182 

XIX Visits to the Trenches .... 188 

XX Flies, Dust and Battle .... 195 

XXI Work of the Zion Mule Corps . . 203 

XXII The Australians and New Zealand- 

ERS 210 

XXIII Voyage to Egypt 222 

XXIV Recruiting in Egypt 228 

XXV Life in Egypt 234 

XXVI Return to Gallipoli 244? 

XXVII Beelzebub 252 

XXVIII A Feat in Gunnery 259 

XXIX The Finding of the Shield of David 269 

XXX Back to England 277 

XXXI The Evacuation 291 

Appendix 297 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

The Hollowed Hand Gives a Very Good Idea of 

THE Appearance of the Country Frontispiece 

PAGE 

The Dardanelles, Sea of Marmora and Bos- 

PHORUS 17 

Badge of the Zion Mule Corps (the Shield 

OF David) 270 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOH 



WITH THE ZIONISTS 
IN GALLIPOLI 

CHAPTER I 

INITtrjDUCTION 

I PROPOSE in the following pages to have some- 
thing to say on the general policy of the Gallipoli 
campaign, and also upon the operations of war 
in execution of that policy. Xow, in the discus- 
sion of these questions, I shall have some criti- 
cisms to make, so it may not be altogether inap- 
propriate to give the reader some little idea of a 
i'tw at least of my qualifications for such a role; 
otherwise he might well be tempted to say: "A 
fig for this fellow and his criticisms. WTiat is 
he but a mere muleteer?" 

Perhaps I may remark, to begin with, that 
when I took over the command of the Zion Mule 
Corps, I knew a great deal about soldiering and 
the art of war, but very little about the muleteer 
or the artful mule. But that's just "a way we 
have in the Army I" 

[17] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

From my boyhood I have either been a soldier 
or taken the keenest interest in soldiering, not 
only in England but in all parts of the world. 
My military experiences extend through home, 
India and South Africa, and have been by no 
means of a sketchy character. I spent the best 
part of three years in South Africa, where I 
conmianded a Yeomanry regiment, and at times 
Regular troops of all arms, during the Boer 
War. 

Those were glorious days — days when one 
could thoroughly enjoy warfare — a wild gallop 
over the veldt, a good fight in the open, and the 
day won by the best men. 

In these days war is robbed of all its glory and 
romance. It is now but a dyke-maker's job, and 
a dirty one at that : but much as the soldier may 
dislike this method of warfare, it has come to 
stay, and we must make the best of a bad job, 
adapt ourselves to the new conditions, and by 
sticking it out, as we have always done, wear 
down the foe. 

In addition to practical experience of soldiers 
and soldiering in England, India, and South 
Africa, I have watched our troops at work and 
play in many out-of-the-way parts of the Empire 
— the Kmg's African Rifles in East Africa and 

[18] 



INTRODUCTIOX 

Uganda; the Cape Mounted Rifles in South Af- 
rica; the "Waffs" in West Africa; the "Gip- 
pies" in Egypt, and the Xorth-West mounted 
men of Canada away in the wilds of the Klon- 
dyke. 

Nor have I confined my attention to the Em- 
pire's soldiers only. 

In my various visits to America, I looked very 
keenly into the training and organisation of the 
American Army. I was especially fortunate 
in being able to do this, as I had the privilege 
of being Colonel Theodore Roosevelt's guest at 
the White House, while he was President, and 
his letters of introduction made me a welcome 
visitor everywhere. I saw something of the Cav- 
alry and Artillery both East and West. I 
watched their Infantry amidst the snows of 
Alaska. I also noted what excellent game pre- 
servers the Cavalry troopers made in the Yellow- 
stone Park — that wonderful National Reserve, 
crammed with nature's wonders and denizens of 
the wild, where a half-tamed bear gave me the 
run of my life! 

Whenever I was with American soldiers, their 
methods were so like our own that I never could 
feel I was with strangers. 

There is only one fault to find with America's 

[19] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Army, and that is that there is not enough of 
it; for its size, I should say that it is one of 
the finest in the world. Never have I seen more 
efficiency anywhere, more keenness among offi- 
cers and N. C. O.'s; and certainly never in any 
army have I eaten such delicious food as is 
supplied to the American private soldier; the 
soldiers' bread, such as I tasted at Fort Riley, 

, baked in military ovens, camiot be surpassed at 

I the "Ritz," "Savoy" or "Plaza." 

It is incomprehensible to me why the average 
American should have such a strong prejudice 
against the Army. He seems to imagine that 
it is some vague kind of monster which, if he 
does not do everything in his power to strangle 
and chain up, will one day turn and rend him, 
and take all his liberties away. 

To give some little idea of the feehng of 
Americans towards soldiers or soldiering, I will 
relate a little conversation which I overheard at 
Davenport, a town away out m the State of 
Iowa. I had had a very strenuous morning in 
the hot sun, watching the 7th Cavalry at squad- 
ron training and other work, and had got back 
to the hotel, thoroughly tired out after my ar- 
duous day. In the afternoon I was sitting on 
the shady side of the hotel which was on the 

[20] 



INTRODUCTION 

main street; at a table near me were seated 
three Americans whose remarks I could not help 
overhearing; they were travellers in various 
small articles, one of them being a specialist in 
neckties; while they were talking two men of 
the 7th Cavalry walked past; my friend, the 
necktie man, looked after them, shook his head, 
and in most contemptuous tones said: "I sup- 
pose we must pay the lazy, useless brutes just 
for the look of the thing." The speaker was a 
pasty-faced, greasy, fat hybrid, about twenty- 
eight years old. I am afraid he was a type of 
which there are many in America; their God is 
the almighty dollar, an idol the blind worship 
of which will one day surely bring its own pun- 
ishment. 

Of course I do not, for a moment, wish it to 
be thought that people of this type predominate 
in America. I am happy to state that among 
her citizens I have met some of the most charm- 
ing, hospitable, intellectual, unselfish and noble 
people to be found on the face of the globe. 

America holds many interests for me, and I 
never fail to pay our cousins a visit when the 
opportunity occurs. Perhaps the chief of her 
attractions, so far as I am concerned, centre in 
and around the State of Virginia, that beautiful 

[21] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

piece of country where most of the great battles 
of the Civil War were fought. 

All my life I have made a point of studying 
military history and the campaigns of the great 
Captains of the past. Indeed, I have tramped 
over many battlefields in Europe, Asia, Africa 
and America, not at all with the idea that the 
knowledge would ever prove of value from a 
military pomt of view, but solely because I was 
deeply interested in soldierly matters. 

In Spain and Flanders I have followed the 
footsteps of both Napoleon and Wellington. 

In Canada I have sailed up the stately St. 
Lawrence, and with Wolfe in imagination again 
stormed the Heights of Abraham. When I 
stood on those heights some one hundi-ed and 
fifty years after the great victory which added 
Canada to the Empire, I was able to realise, 
more fully than I had ever been able to do from 
books, the magnitude of the task which General 
Wolfe had before him when, on that fateful 
night of the 13th September, 1759, he led his 
troops up that precipitous road to victory. 

In the United States I have, on horseback and 
on foot, followed Stonewall Jackson up and 
down the Shenandoah Valley, from Harper's 
Ferry (over the Potomac) to the Wilderness, 

[ '3'^ ] 



IXTRODUCTIOX 

where he was seized with such strange inertia, 
and on to that fatal Chancellorsville where an 
unlucky bullet, fired from his own lines, put an 
end to his life and all chances of victory for the 
South. 

When I was at Washington, General Woth- 
erspoon, the Chief of the War College there, very 
kindly supplied me with maps and notes which 
he had himself made of the battlefield of Gettys- 
burg, and I am convinced that, if General 
Longstreet had arrived on the field in time, 
victory would have rested with the South; 
and I am equally convinced that, if Stone- 
wall Jackson had been alive, Longstreet would 
have been in his proper place at the right 
time. 

"WTiat a pity we have no Stonewall Jackson 
with us in these days. How noble is the epi- 
taph on the monument of this great soldier. I 
only quote the words from memory, but they are 
something like this: 

"When the Almighty in His Omnipotence saw fit to 
give victory to the North over the South, He found that 
it was first necessary to take to Himself Stonewall Jack- 
son." 

It was a great pleasure to me to see his wife, 
Mrs. Stonewall Jackson, when I was at Wash- 

[23] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

ington, but unfortunately I did not have the 
chance of speaking to her. 

I was dehghted to meet Miss Mary Lee sev- 
eral times, the daughter of the best loved Gen- 
eral that ever led an Army — Robert E. Lee, the 
Commander-in-Chief of the Confederate Forces. 
Miss Lee gave me much pleasure by recounting 
many anecdotes about her famous father. 
Among other interesting reminiscences she told 
me that when the war broke out her youngest 
brother was a mere boy still at school, but the 
stirring accounts of the great fights in which his 
father commanded and his older brothers took 
part, so fired his ardour that one day he disap- 
peared from school, and was not heard of by any 
of his family for the best part of a year. Dur- 
ing this time he served as a soldier in a battery 
of Artillery. One day, while a furious battle was 
raging and the fortunes of war swayed first to 
the South and then to the North, General Lee 
observed some of his guns rapidly retiring from 
a particularly hot position. He galloped up to 
them himself and ordered them back into the 
fight. The Commander-in-Chief was somewhat 
surprised when a powder-blackened, mud- 
grimed young soldier, in a blood-stained shirt, 
said to him: "What, Dad, back into that hell 

[24] 



INTRODUCTION 

again?" — and back into that hell the General 
sternly sent them at a gallop, and b^ so doing 
won the day for the South. Luckily, his boy 
came out of the battle unscathed and is alive to 
this day. 

A few years ago I received an invitation from 
the German General Staff to visit Berlin. 
What I saw then, and on subsequent visits, im- 
pressed me very much with the thoroughness of 
the German nation, not only from a military, but 
also from a civil point of view. 

A captain on the Staff was detailed to be my 
"bear-leader," while I was in Berlin. As we 
were strolling down Unter den Linden one day, 
discussing the youthfulness of senior officers 
of the British Army, as compared with those of 
the German Army, he confided to me that when 
he was ordered to conduct an English Colonel, 
he fully expected to see an old and grizzled vet- 
eran, whereas to his astonishment, he found me 
younger than himself, who was only a Captain. 
I shall never forget how, when I laughingly told 
him that I had jumped from Lieutenant to Lieu- 
tenant Colonel in about eight months during the 
South African War, he stopped short in the mid- 
dle of the pavement, saluted me gravely and 
said: "You are Napoleon!" Of course, in 

[25] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

these iiays, this meteoric lhi;ht is quite an every- 
day oeeiiiTenee in our Ariuy ! 

Among many other interesting things that the 
Prussian Captain shmved me Mas their Hall of 
Glory, the walls of which arc covered with pic- 
tures of famous hattles and generals. \Vhilc 
we were there I saw little parties of Prussian 
recruits heing taken from picture to picture, 
guiiled hy veterans. AVith straightened slioul- 
ilers and glowing eye the old soldiers kindled the 
enthusiasm of the coming warriors by recomit- 
ing to them the glorious and daring deeds per- 
formed by their forefathers on many a well- 
fought field. 

This, no doubt, is only one of the numerous 
carefully thought out schemes of the General 
Staff to instil into the German nation the spirit 
of military pride and glory. 

I paid another visit to Germany shortly be- 
fore the present war broke out, and, soon after 
my return, I happened to meet in London the 
German INIilitary Attache, ]Major Renner, who 
seemed most anxious to hear from me what my 
impressions were. I suppose he wondered if I 
had seen much of the vast preparations, which 
were even then being made, for the great war 
into which Germany has plunged the world. 
' [ -20 ] 



IXTRODUCTIOX 

Of all my observations the only things I con- 
fided to hin^i (which he noted down as if they 
were of great importance !j were that I consid- 
ered the abominable type used in German news- 
pajjers and books responsible for the be-spec- 
tacled German ; that although their railway sta- 
tions were wonderfully clean, yet they were 
without a decent platform, and my insular mod- 
esty had been shocked on many occasions by the 
amount of German leg I saw when the ladies 
clambered into and out of the carriages; and 
lastly, that I thought the long and handsome 
cloak worn by the officers might be greatly im- 
proved by making a slit at the side, so that the 
hilt of the sword might be outside, instead of 
inside the cloak, where not only did it make an 
unsightly lump, but was hard to get at in case of 
urgent need. 

A day or two after war was declared, I hap- 
pened to be dining in London with ]Mr. and ]\Irs. 
Walrond. Among the other guests was a Staff 
Officer from the War Office, Major R., who is 
now a general. Hearing that I had been re- 
cently in Germany, he asked me what I thought 
of their chances. I told him that I felt sure that 
Germany would have tremendous victories to 
begin with, and that I believed her armies would 

[27] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLirOIJ 

^"ct to the gates of Paris, but did not tliink they 
would capture Paris this time; and that, al- 
thougli it would take us time, we would beat 
them eventually, for so long as we held com- 
mand of the sea, we were bound to Avin in the 
end. 

Some of the guests at this dinner party have 
since complimented me on the accuracy of the 
lirst part of my prophecy, and I feel absolutely 
convinced that the remainder of my forecast will, 
in spite of all bungling, prove equally true, al- 
ways ])rovided the Navy is given a free hand, 
and allowed to do its work in its oami way. 

In poor, brave little Belgiimi also I had every 
opportunity given to me by the General Staff to 
see their Cavalry at work; and while I was in 
Brussels, Colonel Fourcault, conmianding the 
2nd Guides, gave me the freedom of the bar- 
racks, where I could come and go as I liked. I 
became very good friends with the officers of the 
regiment, and we had discussions about Cav- 
alry, its equipment and lighting value. On 
being asked for my opinion on the relative value 
of the rifle as compared with the lance and sabre, 
I unhesitatingly backed the rifle. I saw that 
the Eelgian Cavalry were armed with a small, 
toylike carbine and a hea\y sabre, and in the 

[-8] * 



INTRODLCTIOX 

discussions which we had, I toJd them that in 
my humble opinion they would he well advised 
to scrap both and adopt the infantry rifle and a 
lighter thrusting sword — but above all I im- 
pressed upon them to be sure about the rifle, as 
the occasions for the use of the arrn.e blanche in 
future would he rare, with all due deference to 
General von Bernhardi. 

I was, of course, looked upon as a Cavalry 
leper for expressing such heretical Ofjinions in a 
Cavalr\' mess, but I had my revenge later on, 
when Captain Donnay de Casteau of the 2nd 
Guides called on me at my club during his stay 
in London after poor little Belgium had been 
crushed. lie came especially to tell me that 
those who were left of the regiment often 
talked of the unorthodox views I had so strongly 
expressed and he said: "We all had to agree 
that every word you told us has proved abso- 
lutely true." 

While I was in Belgium I went down to the 
now famous Mons, and was the guest of the 7th 
Chasseurs a Cheval, where I got a thorough in- 
sight into the interior economy of the regiment. 

It has always been a profound mystery to 
me that our Intelhgence did not give Field-Mar- 
shal French earlier information while he was at 

[29] 



WITH TIIK ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Mons of the fact that large Cernian forces were 
marching upon him from the direction of 
Tournai. Some strange aiul fatal inertia must 
have fallen hoth on tlic Froncli Intelligence and 
our own, otherwise it wouUl have heen impossihle 
for a large (icrman army to have got into this 
threatening position without information having 
heen sent to the Commander-in-Chief. 

AVhcn in Spain I was privileged, owing to 
the courtesy of the ^ladrid War Office, to see 
something of the Spanish ^Vrmy. I cannot say 
that 1 Avas deeply impressed; there was too nmch 
*'j\Ianaii(i" ahout it, or in other words, "Wait and 
seel" From what I ohserved I was not at all 
surprised to find it crumple up hefore the Amer- 
icans in Cuha. It would, however, he a glorious 
thing to he a colonel in the Spanish Army, as 
they seemed to he able to do what was right in 
their own eyes. 

But this was some years ago, and I under- 
stand that the Spanish Army, now that it has 
got a brand-new General Staff, is to be com- 
pletely reorganised and made into a really effi- 
cient fighting force. 

Of course I have many times seen the French 
and Italian armies at work and play — so that 
altogether my knowledge of soldiers and soldier- 

[so ] 



IXTRODUCTION 

m^ is somewhat catholic, and T may therefore 
claim to have some little right to criticise the 
policy, the strategy, and the tactics of the Gal- 
lipoli campaign. 



[SI] 



CTIAFTEH IT 

OENEKAI. rOIJOY OF THE DAKDANELLES CAMPAIGN 

jSLany leaders of tlunight in Knglaiul, >vhosc 
convictions shonld certainly carry weight, are of 
the opinion that the expedition to the Darda- 
nelles was in itself unsound, and should never 
have been undertaken. Now the views of well- 
known practical coninion-scnse men should not 
he lightly thrust aside, but perhaps as one who 
has travelled and read nuieh, and knows the 
Kast and the questions bound up with it fairly 
well, I hope I may not appear too presumptuous 
if I venture to disagree with those who condemn 
the Dardanelles policy. 

It nmst be remembered that although we de- 
clared war on Turkey she had already com- 
mitted several hostile acts on oiu* Russian ally, 
and had flouted us most outrageously by allow- 
ing the Gochrn and Ihrshui the freedom and 
protection of her waters and the resoui*ces of her 
arsenals. 

Of course the escape of these two ships is one 
of the most exti'aordinary bungles of the war, 

[ ^"-^ *] 



GEXERAL POLICY 

which it is to he hoped will he carefully gone into 
at some future time, and the responsible culprit 
brought to hook, for on his head prohahly rests 
the hlood of the countless dead in Gallipoli. 

I have reason to think that it is more than 
doubtful whether the mischievous activity of 
Krivcr Pasha and his satellites would have been 
sufficient to induce the Turkish nation to com- 
mit an act of war against either ourselves or 
Russia, hut for the presence at the gates of Con- 
stantinople of these powerful German warships. 

Our ally having been attacked and we our- 
selves flouted it became necessary for us, if we 
meant to uphold our prestige in the East, to de- 
clare war on Turkey. 

A successful war agaiast the Ottoman Em- 
pire had immease possibilities ia it; the way to 
Russia would be opened, giaas and munitioas 
would have streamed in to her through the Bos- 
phorus, while wheat for ourselves and our allies 
would have streamed out — hut there was a great 
deal more than this at stake, as I shall point out. 

It was well knowa to the Foreign Office that 
unless we showed a strong hand ia the Near 
East, some of the Balkaa States, who were evea 
then treaihling in the halance, would in all prob- 
ability link their fortunes with those of the 

[ 8'^ ] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLirOLI 

enemy. These wavering States wished to join 
the Allies if they saw a reasonable chance of the 
Allies' success. On the other hand Austria, 
hacked up hy llie might of Germany, was at 
their gates, and with Belgium as an object les- 
son they feared for their country. What there- 
fore could have been more calculated to gain 
them to our side than a smashing blow which 
would crumple up Turkey and give us direct 
communication with Russia? Had we suc- 
ceeded (and we ought to have succeeded) it is 
certain that Greece and Rumania would now be 
fighting on our side; the astute Ferdinand would 
have seen on which side his bread was buttered, 
and have either kept Bulgaria neutral, or made 
common cause with the Allies; and tliose unfor- 
tunate little States, Serbia and INIontenegro, 
would not have been betrayed and ground to 
dust. 

The fall of Constantinople would once more 
have been a great epoch-making event, which 
would have changed the course of the world's 
history, for with its fall our victorious army, 
hand in hand with Russia, would have made a 
triumphant march through the Balkans, where 
every State would then have rallied to our side. 

This allied flood would nmnber between two 

[3i] 



genp:ral policy 

and three millions of men, and with this irresist- 
ible force we would have burst upon the plains 
of Hungary and on to the heart of the Empire. 
Such an advance is not new to history, as the 
Turks themselves, when in the zenith of their 
power, overran Austria-Hungary and were only 
denied the domination of Europe under the very 
walls of Vienna itself, where, as everybody 
knows, they were defeated by John Sobiesky. 
No modern Sobiesky would have been found 
strong enough to deprive us of our prey, and 
with the fall of Vienna Austria would have been 
crushed, and the war would soon have come to a 
victorious end. 

Even if we did not penetrate quite so far, the 
very fact of such a large army advancing from 
the south and east would have drawn an im- 
mense number of the enemy's troops from the 
Eastern and Western fronts, which would have 
given the Russians, the French and ourselves an 
opportunity of smashing through on those 
fronts and between us crushing Germany. 

Yes, undoubtedly the fall of Constantinople 
was of vital importance, and for once our poli- 
ticians were right. 

In addition to our material gains in Europe, 
our prestige throughout the East would have 

[35] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

reached a pinnacle such as it has never yet at- 
tained, and there would have been no such nuts 
for us to crack as the Egyptian, Persian, or 
Mesopotamian questions. 

Germany would be completely henmied in 
and the strangling grip of our fleet would have 
been irresistible when this last link with the outer 
world had been severed. 

Germany's wheat supply from Rumania, cop- 
per from Serbia, cottons, fats and other vital 
products from Turkey would be cut off, and 
economic life in the Central Empires would in a 
very short time have been made intolerable. 



[36] 



CHAPTER III 

STRATEGY AND TACTICS OF THE DARDANELLES 
CAMPAIGN 

Now, having recognised the tremendous issues 
which were involved in the fall of Constanti- 
nople, it may be asked did the Government pro- 
vide a weapon sufficiently strong to carry out 
their policy? In my humble opinion they did, — 
if only the weapon had been rightly handled. 

Of course, whoever is to blame for the Bed- 
lamite policy of the first disastrous attempts by 
the Navy alone bears a heavy responsibihty. 
Beyond knocking the entrance forts to pieces, all 
that this premature attack by the Fleet effected 
was to give the Turks ample warning of our in- 
tentions, of which they took full advantage by 
making the GaDipoli Peninsula an almost im- 
pregnable fortress and the Dardanelles a net- 
work of mines. 

But even this grave initial blunder could have 
been rectified, if only sound strategy had been 
adopted in the combined naval and military at- 
tack on the Dardanelles. 

[37] 



WITH niK ZIONISTS IN GALLirOLl 

The problem before the str:itci;ists was. oi' 
couvsc, to i^vt throui^b to Ciinstnutinonle wilb 
the Fleet, aiul tins eouUl only be clone by t'orelni;* 
the Narrows, a strip o( tbe HarJanelles beavily 
fortitied and only a mile wide. It was tberet'ore 
neeossary to rednee tbe forts gnarding tbe Nar- 
rows, and with an army to bold tbe beigbts on 
Callipoli dominating tbe Danlanelles. so as to 
ensnre tbe safety oi' tbe Fleet. 

Having* command oi' tbe seas gave ns tbe 
eboiee o( lannebing tbe attack at any point we 
cbosc on tbe Tnrkisb coast : tberet'ore tbe Turks 
were at tbe great disadvantage o( having to di- 
vide their t'orces into several parts, so as to giiaril 
such points as they thought might possibly be 
attacked. 

It was known that there was a Turkish army 
on the Asiatic side, at tbe south of Chanak, the 
principal Fort on the Asiatic shore oi' tbe Nar- 
rows; also that tbe Bulair lines, some forty miles 
from tbe extremity oi' the Peninsula, were 
strongly fortitieil and held; that a strong force 
was entrenched on tbe southern portion of the 
Peninsula in tbe neighbourhood of Capo Ilelles: 
and, in addition, that there was yet another 
Turkish army holding tbe heights on tbe 3ilgean 
at. or near, a point now known as Anzac. 

[88] 



STRATEGY AXD TACTICS 

Now, if any one will take the trouble to study 
the map, which will be found at the end of this 
book, he will see that the key to the Xarrows is 
that portion of the Gallipoli Peniasula which 
extends across from Anzac on the yJOgcan, 
through the heights of Sari Bair, to the Darda- 
nelles. 

If, therefore, instead of dividing the Medi- 
terranean Expeditionary Force (which unfortu- 
nately was the plan adopted) and having it held 
up or destroyed in detail, the whole force had 
been thrown in its entirety at this point, and a 
vigorous sledge-hammer blow delivered, I feel 
absolutely confident that a crowning victory 
would have been gained and the exjjedition 
would have been a glorious success. 

Of the four Turkish armies the only one that 
could have opposed a sudden vigorous thrust at 
the key position was the one at and near Anzac, 
and this force we could have swept aside and 
crumpled ujj before any of the others could pos- 
sibly have come to its assistance. 

That the Expedition ar\' Force could have been 
landed here is proved by the fact that the two 
Australian and Xew Zealand Divisions did land 
here, and these dauntless men, by themselves, al- 
most succeeded in taking Sari Bair and getting 

[39] 



AVITII THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

astride the Peninsula. For eight months they 
held their end up, and more than held it up, 
against overwhehning odds. Had they been 
haeked up at the time of the lirst landing on 
April 25th, 1915, by the "incomparable 'JOth 
Division," one of the best the British ^Vrmy has 
ever seen, together with the two French Divi- 
sions, witli their hundred celebrated .75 guns, 
and the Royal Naval Division, no Turkish 
troops at that time in the neighbourhood could 
for a moment have stood up against them, and 
with our grip once established on the Peninsula 
nothing could have shaken us olf — not all the 
soldiers in the Ottoman Empire. 

Every Turk on the southern portion of Gal- 
lipoli must inevitably have fallen into our hands 
within a few days, for it was well known that 
they were but ill supplied with ammunition and 
food. There was no chance of escape for tluni, 
for our Fleet commanded all the waters round 
Gallipoli up to the very Narrows themselves, 
and nothing could possibly have gained the Asi- 
atic shore; while anything attempting to cross 
at the Narrows would have been inevitably sunk 
by the artillery which we would have mounted 
on the dominating heights of the Peninsula. 
No help could reach them from Constantinople, 

[to] 



STUATEGY AND TACTICS 

for the same reason, and it would have been in 
vain for them to have endeavoured to break 
through our lines, as was proved over and over 
again in the many determined but futile assaults 
they made on us in Gallipoli, when they were in- 
variably hurled back with enormous losses. 

Once astride the Peninsula, where our length 
of front would be less than seven miles, with 
over six men to the yard holding it, nothing 
could have shaken off our strangling hold. It 
would only then have been a question of direct- 
ing the fire of the heavy naval guns on the Forts 
in the Narrows, which would, of course, be done 
by direct observation, and these strongholds 
would have been pounded to dust by the Queen 
Elizabeth and other battleships within a week, 
thus leaving open the road to Constantinople. 
Such might have been the glorious ending of the 
Gallipoli campaign if only sound strategical and 
tactical methods had been employed. 

It is a thousand pities that this plan of opera- 
tions was not adopted, for with such proved 
commanders as General d'Amade, General 
Birdwood and General Ilunter-Weston — 
thrusters all — and y/'ith such incomparable men, 
there would have been no "fatal inertia" to 
chronicle, 

[41] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

It must be remembered that at the time of 
this landing on April 2jth, the Turks had had 
but little time to organise then* defences and it 
would then have been a much easier task to have 
seized the heights of Sari Bair than when the 
attempt was made with raw troops later on in 
August, an attempt which, even with all the 
drawbacks chronicled against it, came within an 
ace of being a success. 

Another great advantage was that the weather, 
when we landed in April, was much cooler; 
there was also an ample rainfall, so that there 
would have been no difficulty about drinking- 
water, a lack of which in August proved fatal 
to the attemj)t made in that hot, dry month. 
We did not, of course, rely upon a chance rain- 
fall at the time of our landmg, for, as I shall 
show later on, ample provision had been made 
for carrying and supplying water, at all events 
for the 29th Division. 

Unfortunately, such a plan of campaign as I 
have outlined was not put into execution. In- 
stead, the force was split up into no less than 
nine parts, and practically destroyed in detail, 
or brought to a standstill by the Turks. 

The Australian and New Zealand Divisions 
landed at Anzac, the key position; the 29th Di- 

[42] 



STRATEGY AND TACTICS 

vision beat themselves to death attacking six dif- 
ferent and aknost impregnable positions on the 
toe of the Peninsula, where, I dare to say, not a 
single man ought ever to have been landed; in 
addition to the opposition they met with in Gal- 
lipoli they were subjected to a rain of shells 
from Asia, not only at the time of landing but 
throughout the whole time we wasted in occupy- 
ing this utterly (from a military point of view) 
useless end of the Peninsula. 

The Royal Naval Division was sent some- 
where in the direction of the Bulair Lines, where 
it effected nothing, and the two French Divi- 
sions made an onslaught on the Asiatic coast, 
which, although well conceived and most gal- 
lantly put into execution, helped the main cause 
not at all. Of course, they were invaluable in 
preventing the Asiatic guns from firing on the 
29th Division at the time of the landing, but 
then this Division should of course have been 
landed at Anzac, where they would have been 
out of range of those guns. Whatever Turkish 
force opposed the French at Kum Kale could 
never have got across the Dardanelles in time to 
have opposed our landing at or near Anzac. 

If it had been thought necessary to make dem- 
onstrations on the Asiatic coast, at the toe of 

[43] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

the Peninsula, and at the Bulair Lines, this could 
have been done equally well by sending the 
empty transports to those places, escorted by a 
few gunboats, and thus have held the Turks in 
position by making a pretence at throwing 
troops ashore at those points. 

Of course, it is easy to be wise after the event, 
but I never did see, and never could see, the 
point of dividing our force and landing on the 
southern part of Gallipoli, for, once we had 
got astride the Peninsula from Anzac to the 
Narrows, all the Turks to the south of us must 
have fallen into our mouths, like ripe plums. 

Napoleon has placed it on record that it is 
the besetting sin of British commanders to frit- 
ter away their forces by dividing them and so 
laying themselves open to be defeated in detail. 
It would appear that we have not even yet taken 
Napoleon's maxim to heart, for if ever there 
was an occasion on which it was absolutely vital 
to keep the whole force intact for a mighty blow, 
it was on that fateful Sunday morning, April 
25th, 1915, when one concentrated thrust from 
Anzac to the Narrows would have undoubtedly 
placed in our hands the key of the Ottoman 
Empire. 

The Dardanelles campaign will go down to 

[44] 



STRATEGY AND TACTICS 

history as the greatest failure sustained by Brit- 
ish arms, and yet no more glorious deeds have 
ever been performed by any army in the world. 



[45] 



CHAPTER IV 

FORINIATION OF THE ZION MULE CORPS 

From the days of my youth I have always been 
a keen student of the Jewish people, their his- 
tory, laws and customs. Even as a boy I spent 
the greater part of my leisure hours poring over 
the Bible, especially that portion of the Old 
Testament Avhicli chronicles battles, murders, 
and sudden deaths, little thinking that this Bib- 
lical knowledge would ever be of any practical 
value in after life. 

It was strange, therefore, that I, so imbued 
with Jewish traditions, should have been drawn 
to the land where the Pharaohs had kejit the 
Children of Israel in bondage for over four hun- 
dred years; and it was still more strange that I 
should have arrived in Egypt just at the psy- 
chological moment when General Sir John JNIax- 
well, the Commander-in-Chief, was looking out 
for a suitable officer to raise and command a 
Jewish unit. 

Now, such a thing as a Jewish unit had been 
unknown in the annals of the world for some 

[46] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS 

two thousand 5^ears — since the days of the ]\Iac- 
cabees, those heroic Sons of Israel who fought 
so vahantlj^ and for a time so successfully, to 
wrest Jerusalem from the grasp of the Roman 
legions. 

It had happened that there had come down to 
Egypt out of Palestine many hundreds of peo- 
ple who had fled from thence to escape the wrath 
of the Turks. These people were of Russian 
nationality but of Jewish faith, and many of 
them strongly desired to band themselves to- 
gether into a fighting host and place their lives 
at the disposal of England, whom the Jews have 
recognised as their friend and protector from 
time immemorial. Indeed, by many it is held 
that the British people are none other than some 
of the lost tribes; moreover, we have taken so 
much of Jewish national life for our own, mainly 
owing to our strong Biblical leanings, that the 
Jews can never feel while with us that they are 
among entire strangers. 

Xow these people having made known their 
wishes to the Commander-in-Chief, he, in a 
happy moment of inspiration, saw how much it 
would benefit England, morally and materially, 
to have bound up with our fortunes a Jewish 
fighting unit. 

[47J 



AVITII THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

The next thing to be done was to lind a suit- 
able British officer to conmmnd this unique 
force, and at the time of my arrival in Cairo, 
General JNIaxwell had already applied for "a 
tactful thruster" to be chosen from among the 
otlicers of the Indian Brigade then doing duty 
on the Suez Canal. 

^ly opportune arrival, however, coupled with 
a strong backing from an old friend, JNIajor- 
General Sir Alexander Godley, decided him to 
offer me the command. 

It certainly was curious that the General's 
choice shouUl have fallen upon me, for, of course, 
he knew nothing of my knowledge of Jewish 
history, or of my sympathy for the Jewish race. 
When, as a boy, I eagerly devoured the records 
of the glorious deeds of JcAvish niilitiny captains 
such as Joshua, Joab, Giiloon and Judas jNlac- 
cabanis, I little ilreamt that one day I, myself, 
would, in a small way, be a captain of a host of 
the Children of Israel! 

On the 19th ^March, 1915, I was appointed to 
my unique command, and on the same day I left 
Cairo for Alexandria, where all the refugees 
from Palestine were gathered together as the 
guests of the British Govermnent. 

On my arrival there, I lost no time in getting 
[ -is ] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS 

into touch with the leading members of the Jew- 
ish Community, arid I found the Grand liabbi 
(Professor Raphael della Pergola), Mr. Ed- 
gard Suares, Mr. Isaac Aghion, Mr. Piccioto 
and others, all most sympathetic and eager to as- 
sist me in every possible way. Nor must I for- 
get that an imy)etus was given to the recruiting 
by the reeei()t of a heartening cablegram from 
Mr. Israel Zangwill, whose name is a household 
word to all Zionists. 

On the 23rd March, 1915, the young .Jewish 
volunteers were paraded for the purpose of 
being "sworn in" at the refugee camp at Gibbari. 

It was a most imposing ceremony; the Grand 
Rabbi, who officiated, stood in a commanding 
position overlooking the long rows of serious and 
intelligent-looking lads. He explained to them 
the meaning of an oath, and the importance of 
keeping it, and impressed upon them that the 
honour of Israel rested in their hands. He then 
asked them to repeat after him, word for word, 
the oath of military obedience to myself* and 
such officers as should be appointed over them, 
and with great solemnity, and in perfect unison, 
the men, with uplifted hands, repeated the 
formula. 

The Grand Rabbi then delivered a stirring 

[ID] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLirOLI 

address to the new soldiers, in which he compared 
them to their forefathers who had been led out 
of Egypt by jMoses, and at the end he turned to 
me and presented me to them as their modern 
leader. 

This memorable and liistoric scene aroused 
the greatest enthusiasm among the throng of 
Jewish sympathisers wlio had come to witness 
this interesting ceremony. 

The sanctioned strength of the Corps in of- 
iiccrs and men "was roughly 500, with 20 riding 
horses for officers and the senior non-commis- 
sioned officers, and 750 pack mules for trans- 
port work. 

To assist me in commanding the Corps, I had 
live British and eight Jewish officers. 

The Grand Kabbi of Alexandria, a most 
pious, earnest and learned man, was appointed 
our honourary chaplain. 

I was extremely fortunate in my British of- 
ficers, for although they had never served in the 
Army, or knew an}i:hing about military routine, 
yet they were all practical men, and, after all, 
at least in war-time, everything depends upon 
having officers with plenty of conmion sense. 

I had ^Ir. D. Gye, who was lent to me from 
the Egyptian ^linistry of Finance; ^Messrs. 

[50] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS 

Carver and Maclaren, expert bankers and cot- 
ton-brokers; and the two brothers, Messrs. C. 
and I. llolo, whose business house is known not 
only in Egypt, but also in the greater part of the 
world. 

I was, indeed, lucky in getting such good men 
who loyally seconded me in everything and 
quickly mastered the details necessary for the 
running of the Corps; nor did they spare them- 
selves during those four weeks of slavery which 
we together put in while getting the men ready 
for active service. 

In addition to these British officers, I had, as 
I have already stated, eight Jewish officers. 
One of these. Captain Trump ledor, had already 
been a soldier in the Russian Army, had been 
through the siege of Port Arthur, where he had 
lost his left arm, and had been given the Order 
of St. George (in gold) by the Czar for his gal- 
lantry and zeal during that celebrated siege. 

Among the N. C. O.'s and men I had every 
conceivable trade and calling; highly educated 
men like Mr. Gorodisky, a Professor at the 
Lycee in Alexandria, and afterwards promoted 
to commissioned rank; students of Law, Medi- 
cine, and Divinity; mechanics of all kinds, of 
whom I found the tinsmith the most useful. 

[51] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Even a Rabbi was to be found in the ranks, who 
was able to administer consolation to the dying 
and burial rites to those who were struck down 
when death came amongst us before the enemy 
in Gallipoli. I also discovered among the en- 
listed soldiers a fully-qualified medical man, Dr. 
Levontin, whom I appointed our sm'geon after 
having obtained permission to form a medical 
unit. 

Through the kindness and practical sympathy 
of Surgeon-General Ford, the Director of jMed- 
ical Services in Egypt, I soon had a hospital in 
being, with its tents, beds, orderlies and sani- 
tary section. 

Altogether we were a little family; unit com- 
plete within ourselves. 

I divided the Corps, for purposes of interior 
economy, into four troops, each with a British 
and Jewish officer in command; each troop was 
again divided into four sections with a sergeant 
in charge, and each section was again subdi- 
vided into subsections with a corporal in charge ; 
and so the chain of responsibility went down to 
the lively mule himself — and, by the shades of 
Jehoshaphat, couldn't some of those mules 
kick!! Sons of Belial would be a very mild 
name for them. 

[52] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS 

One of the first things to be attended to was 
to find a suitable place upon which to train the 
men and mules. I eventually secured an excel- 
lent site at Wardian from Brigadier-General 
Stanton, then commanding at Alexandria. 
Here we pitched our tents and went into camp 
on April 2nd, 1915. 

It was no light task to get uniforms, equip- 
ment, arms, ammunition, etc., for such a body 
of men at short notice, but in a very few days I 
had my men all under canvas, my horses and 
hundreds of mules pegged out in lines, and the 
men marching up and down, drilling to Hebrew 
words of command. 

Never since the days of Judas Maccabseus had 
such sights and sounds been seen and heard in a 
military camp; indeed, had that redoubtable 
General paid us a surprise visit, he might have 
imagined himself with his own legions, because 
here he would have found a great camp with the 
tents of the Children of Israel pitched round 
about; he would have heard the Hebrew tongue 
spoken on all sides, and seen a little host of the 
Sons of Judah drilling to the same words of 
command that he himself used to those gallant 
soldiers who so nobly fought against Rome 
under his banner; he would even have heard the 

[53] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

plaintive soul-stirring music of the ]Maccab«an 
hymn chanted by the men as they marched 
through the camp. 

Although Hebrew was the language gener- 
ally used, nevertheless I drilled the men in Eng- 
lish also, as it was fitting that they should under- 
stand English words of command. 

The men were armed with excellent rifles, 
bayonets and ammunition, all captured from the 
Turks when they made their futile assault on 
the Suez Canal. 

For our badge we had the "]Magin David," an 
exact reproduction of the Shield of David, such 
as he perhaps used when, as the Champion of 
Israel, he went out to fight Goliath of Gath. 

It may, perhaps, be wondered why we were 
equipped with rifles, bayonets and ammunition, 
but this is one of the unique things about this 
unique Corps that, although it was only a ]Mule 
Corps, yet it was a fighting unit, and of this, of 
course, the men were all very proud. 

When we were getting our equipment from 
Cairo, I left Lieutenant Carver there to draw 
it from the Arsenal in the Citadel and bring it to 
Alexandria, telling him that above all things he 
must never lose sight of the gear, for if he did 

[54] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS 

it would certainly be appropriated by somebody 
else. 

Among other things, he was drawing pack 
saddlery for our mules, which I was anxious to 
obtain quickly in order to go on with the train- 
ing of the men. 

Carver saw the pack saddles safely put into 
the railway wagons at Cairo, saw the wagons 
locked, sealed, and consigned to me at Alex- 
andria, but the moment they arrived at Gibbari 
a prowling marauder from the Royal Naval Di- 
vision, happening to spot the wagons and see 
what they contained by the ticket on the outside, 
induced the "Gippy" station-master to deliver 
them to him, and before I even knew that they 
had arrived at the station, all my pack saddles 
were safely on board ship and on their way to 
Suez with the Naval Division! 

I tracked down the culprit, who not only had 
to disgorge but, I understand, to pay for the 
transit of the saddlery back to Alexandria; al- 
though this may have been a lesson for the buc- 
caneer and might for the future make him 
"tread lightly" like Agag, yet it did not com- 
pensate me for the annoying delay caused by this 
unblushing robbery. 

[55] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

The work of training went on from dawn to 
dark, as officers and men had to be taught every- 
thing from the ground-floor up. Not a moment 
coukl be wasted. Drilling and parades were the 
order of the day ; horses and mules had to be ex- 
ercised, fed and watered three times a day; the 
men had to be taught how to saddle and un- 
saddle them, load and unload packs; they had 
also to be instructed in the use of the rifle and 
bayonet. Camp kitchens had to be constructed. 
Horse and mule lines had to be swept and 
garnished, tents cleaned out, etc., and a thou- 
sand and one things crammed into the day's 
work. 

Notwithstanding the zeal and energy which 
we all put forth to get the Corps ready, yet had 
it not been for the sympathy of General INIax- 
well, and the active help of his Staff Officer, Cap- 
tain Holdich, I fear it would have been impos- 
sible for us to have made the rapid progress we 
did in such a short space of time. I think it 
must be, in its way, a record to form, equip and 
train a unit of this description and have it actu- 
ally in the firing line, and doing useful work 
there, in a little over three weeks ! 

It speaks volumes for the keenness of the men, 
and for the intelligent way in which Wiey im- 

[56] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS 

bibed the knowledge which was crammed into 
them in such feverish haste. 

After a couple of weeks' training we were spe- 
cially favoured by a notification that the Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the Mediterranean Expedi- 
tionary Force, General Sir Ian Hamilton, 
would inspect us. It was with mixed feelings 
that I received this order, for, of course, it meant 
a special parade, and also that the whole of the 
routine of drills, etc., would have to be knocked 
out for one afternoon, and as every moment was 
precious this was no light matter. 

The Commander-in-Chief came and made his 
inspection a few days before he sailed for Mud- 
ros, and was most complimentary on the work- 
manlike appearance which the Corps presented. 

I was delighted to receive about this time a 
notification that my Corps should be held in read- 
iness to embark for the front at an early date. 

A few daj^s before we embarked I had the 
privilege of partaking of the Feast of the Pass- 
over with the Grand Rabbi and his family at 
Alexandria. It will readily be understood with 
what feelings of deep interest I took part in the 
various rites. I seemed to be living again in the 
days of Moses when, in this very same land and 
not very far distant, the Children of Israel 

[57] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

sprinkled their doorposts with the blood of the 
lamb, and partook of the Feast with their loins 
girded, their staves in their hands, on the eve of 
their departure from the land of bondage. I 
had to ask myself if it were all a dream. It 
seemed so strange that I should be partaking of 
the same Feast fom* thousand years later on the 
eve of m)^ departure, with a number of the Chil- 
dren of Israel, to wander and suffer anew in an- 
other wilderness. 

Every bit of the ceremony was gone through, 
the eating of unleavened bread and bitter herbs, 
the di'inking of wine and vinegar, each sym- 
bolical of the trials to be gone through by the 
Israelites before reaching the Promised Land. 
All had its charm for me, and when my hostess 
came romid with a towel and ewer and basin, to 
w^ash my hands at certain times during the Feast, 
it visualised to me as nothing else could have 
done those far away days when Pharaoh ruled 
the land. 

The Grand Rabbi had his tliree handsome 
boys at his knees, the youngest a living image of 
one of ^Murillo's cherubs. He recounted to 
them in Hebrew the story of their forefathers' 
sojourn in Egj^pt, and their subsequent wander- 
ings in the wilderness, as no doubt the same story 

[58] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS 

has been told by the Fathers of Israel to their 
children for countless generations. "And thou 
shalt show thy son in that day, saying: This is 
done because of that which the Lord did unto 
me when I came forth from Egypt." 

During our training period in Alexandria, 
we were the recipients of many acts of kindness 
from the community there. The men were 
given gifts by a committee of ladies, composed 
of the Baronne Felix de Menasce, Madame 
Rolo, Madame Israel, Mesdames E. and J. 
Goar, and a host of others. 

We had a last big parade, and marched from 
Wardian Camp for some three miles through 
the streets of Alexandria to the Synagogue, to 
receive the final blessing of the Grand Rabbi. 
The spacious Temple, in the street of the 
Prophet Daniel, was on this occasion filled to its 
utmost capacity. The Grand Rabbi exhorted 
the men to bear themselves like good soldiers and 
in times of difficulty and danger to call upon the 
Name of the Lord who would deliver them out 
of their adversity. His final benediction was 
most solemn and impressive, and will never be 
forgotten by those who were privileged to be 
present. 

A couple of days later we received orders to 

[59] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

embark for Gallipoli with all possible speed. 
We therefore strained every nerve to get aboard 
in good time and in ship-shape order. 

The Corps was divided into two parts, the 
Headquarters and two troops going on H. M. 
Transport Hymettus, and two troops on H. JM. 
Transport A nglo-Egyptian. 

It was no easy task in so short a time to get 
men, mules, horses, forage, equipment, etc., 
from Wardian Camp to the docks, a distance of 
two or three miles, and we worked practically 
all day and all night slinging horses and mules 
on board, tying them up in their stalls, and 
storing baggage and equipment, etc., in the 
holds. Thirty days' forage for the animals and 
rations for the men were also put under the 
hatches. 

As one of our duties in Gallipoli would be to 
supply the troops in the trenches with water, an 
Alexandi'ian firm had been ordered to make 
some thousands of kerosene oil tins, the manu- 
facture of which is a local industiy. Wooden 
frames had also been ordered to fit on to the pack 
saddles, so as to enable the mules to carry the 
tins. Each mule was to carry four of these full 
of water, equal to sixteen gallons. The tins ar- 
rived in good time, but the wooden frames were 

[60] 



THE ZIOX MULE CORPS 

late in delivery, and held us up over a day and a 
half beyond our time in Alexandria Docks. 

At last, having obtained delivery of the indis- 
pensable wooden crates, we joyfully steamed out 
of harbour en route for Gallipoli on the 17th 
April, 1915, 



[61] 



CHAPTER V 

ARRIVAL AT LEMNOS 

We were not the only troops on board the 
llymettus. There were some gunner officers of 
siege batteries, and some officers and men of the 
Koyal xVi-my 3Iedical Corps; a stationary hos- 
pital with the necessary staff of the K. A. !M. C. 
men, as well as some other odds and ends for 
various units of the Expeditionary Force abeady 
at Lenmos. I happened to be the Senior Officer 
on board, so was Officer Commanding the troops 
duriiii>' the vova^e. 

I would like to mention here that the captain, 
chief officer, and chief engineer, of the Hij- 
meitus were most helpful in every possible way, 
and I am glad to be able to pay this little tribute 
to them for all their kindness to us while we were 
aboard. 

One of the most interesting of our fellow voy- 
agers was Captain Edmunds, R. A. M. C, one 
of the medical officers in charge of the Austra- 
han Hospital stores. He had been taken pris- 
oner by the Germans while attending to the 



ARRIVAL AT LEMNOS 

wounded during the retreat from Mons, and he 
told us many tales of his bad treatment at their 
hands. lie was kept a prisoner for a consider- 
able time, but finally was released owing to some 
interchange of medical officers between England 
and Germany. 

The voyage to Lemnos was quite uneventful. 
We, fortunately, missed the Turkish torpedo- 
boat that tried to sink the Manitou, a transport 
just ahead of us. This troopship had quite an 
adventurous time. The torpedo-boat stopped 
her and the Turkish commander, with rare hu- 
manity, called out that he would give them ten 
minutes to save themselves. I am told that 
there was a German officer on the bridge who 
M^as heard quarrelling with the Turkish com- 
mander for being so lenient. 

The Manitou lowered her boats in a very great 
hurry, and unluckily a couple of them tilted up, 
with the result that some fifty or sixty men were 
drowned. At the end of the time limit the Turks 
discharged a torpedo. Now when this missile is 
first fired it takes a dive before it steadies itself 
on its course, and as the two vessels were close to- 
gether, luckily for the Manitou, the dive took the 
torpedo well under her keel; the same thing hap- 
pened when the second and third torpedoes were 

[63] 



WVVU rilK ZIONISTS IN CAI.LIVOM 

laum'luHl; (inally. ;is [\\c 'Vuvk >v:is alunil to o\H'n 
tiro Miul sink llio troopship >vith his liiiiis, ti Hrit- 
ish dostri>vor vacoil up at I'lill spood and chasod 
the marauilor on to tho riK'ks ot' a C^rooian islo. 
whore tlio Turkish vossol hooanio a total >vrook. 

The training- of tho Zionists wont stoadily t'or- 
MarJ cMi bivn-il ship, t'or many ot" tho niou >voro 
still quito raw -in t'aot, I rooruitod sovoral on 
tlio shi[> a t'ow hmu's bot'oro wo sailod. Tlio 
niulos and hcn*sos took up a throat lioal of tinio 
ovory day. but wo novor had cm\o siok or sorry; 
and I may say horo that wo novor lost o!io from 
siokness all the time wo >voro in Ciallipoli. whioh 
must, I think, bo a rooord. 

On April llOth wo arrived at TA^nnos and 
anohored just inside tho entranoo o( Muilros 
harbour in a blinding >vind and rain stcn-m. It 
will be remembered that when the gods quar- 
relled, dove hurled \'uloan out o( C)lympus on 
to l.onmos. whore he established a forgo imdor- 
groimd. The morning following our arrival, 
one o( the transports to windward o( us began 
to drag her anehor, so our eaptain weighed ini- 
motliatoly, fearing a eollision. and we sailed right 
through the tleet to the opposite end oi' the 
great land-looked harbour. Never in all my 
life had I seen sueh a mighty armada of battle- 

[tu] 



ARRIVAL AT LEMNOS 

ships, cruisers, destroyers, transports, etc. The 
Queen Elizabeth was there, looking for all the 
world like a floating fortress. There were some 
quaint French battleships, while the Russian 
cruiser Askold caused universal attention, owing 
to her five slim funnels. With the soldier's cus- 
tomary knack of giving appropriate names, the 
Askold was known throughout the Fleet as "the 
packet of Woodbines." Our Zionists, as we 
sailed by, astonished her crew by bandying 
words with them in Russian. 

Our trip up the harbour was not to end with- 
out adventure, for, on turning round to cast 
anchor, our ship ran aground on a mud bank. 
Here we stuck fast and all the King's horses and 
all the King's men failed to tug us off again. 
Time after time naval officers came along with 
tug-boats and vessels of various kinds which 
strained to release us, but each attempt was a 
hopeless failure. 

On the afternoon of the 23rd, I got somewhat 
of a shock on being informed that the Zion Mule 
Corps was to be divided. The half on the Hy~ 
mettus was to go with the 29th Division, and the 
other half, those already on board the Anglo- 
Egyptian, were to be sent with the Australians 
and New Zealanders. Of course, this arrange- 

[65] 



\\ I rii n\v .'lOMsrs i\ i.;Ai i uhm i 

m<^it \vv>uU hiive Iveu aU ri^ht if th<\^ thivt^ Di- 
Ykk>iX!!i hail Ihvu lj«\d<Hl At Iht' $<»M\e plHv\\ but 
as they wt^iv X\> iW^tnxh^xk $\x(\x<^ i\\Mtn miX^ 
A)\ivt it >vv>ulv] be uw^Hv^^ibW t\xv \\\e tv> kcx^i^ tux 
eye on K^th hHlvt\s ot* the Cov^vi* «uU I ^^ivj^tly 
fe^AVvl that the halt* away t\\uu uiy own )>er$vvual 
KsiwpejrYkk>i» wouUl not pixne a sxkw^^^, t\>r (vf* 
tiwrss, \. v>\ O/s and u\en >veiv eutii-elN uvw tv> 
5ivxldierin^4i» and it was tvx^ uwieh tv^ exptvt that 
they wuKl g\> straight into the tiring hne. after 
oixly sv>n\e thitv wtvks' training, and iwnte 
thivngh the orvteal triuu\phantly without an ex- 
l^rienetxi i\unn\aniier. 

I. theivfoiv, after nianv vain endoawnns tv^ 
get away» hailal a pajtsing lavineh^ which, asS a 
great favvnn\ put me on K^rvl the statY sliip, the 
AfWidian, where I ha J an interview with the 
Deputy Quarterniaster-C general, anvl beggwl of 
him not to divide the Corjx^ as 1 feaird tt\at 
thi\<e awav fnnw nw cvixtn^l wvmUl pivni- but a 
hn^Ven ivevi. \\c {Ad uw, however, tluit it was 
impossible tv> alter niiitters, and that the Aus- 
tralians and New Zealnudors had had praotieidly 
no transpvM't, exwpt w hat my C\>rps w vnild sup- 
ph% and that in any ease we wouUl not bo scpn 
ratal for more than fiun* days, Invause it" wt« 
wuld not crush the Txnks in that time, between 



ARRIVAL AT LEMXOS 

the two forces, we were going to give up the at- 
tempt and return to our ships. 

Well, we did not crush the Turks in the four 
days, and, having failed, it was not so easy to get 
away, and the result was that, owing to lack 
of experience, and mismanagement in the han- 
dling of them, the two troops with the Austra- 
lians, after a couple of weeks' service with that 
force, were sent hack to Alexandria, without any 
reference to me, and there dishanded. 

As there were no boats available, I had the 
greatest difficulty in getting away from the 
Arcadian, and it was only after wasting many 
valuable hours and meeting with many rebuffs, 
that I eventually got a kind-hearted sailor to 
give me a lift Ijack to the Ilymettus. A few 
steam launches were badly needed to enable com- 
manding officers to go aboard the staff ship to 
discuss with the chiefs of the various depart- 
ments such items as can only be settled satisfac- 
torily at a personal interview. 

I must say that I was not at all pleased with 
our position on the mudbank, where, in spite of 
all efforts to move us, we still remained stuck. 
In the first place, I feared that we would be 
unable to get away with the rest of the trans- 
ports on the morning of the 25th, the date fixed 

[67] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

for the great attack, and even if by chance an- 
other vessel could be found for us, it would mean 
transhipping all the men, horses, mules, bag- 
gage, forage and equipment, which would be an 
immense labour in an open harbour like JNIudros, 
where it is often blowing half a gale. It is no 
wonder that, as each attempt at hauling off the 
Hymettus failed, I grew more and more anxious 
as to our ultimate chance of getting away in 
time to see the start of the great fight in Gal- 
lipoli. 

At last, on the 24th, the naval officers en- 
gaged on the work gave up all further attempts 
to haul us off, and reported the task as hope- 
less — at any rate until everything was removed 
from the ship. In the course of an hour I re- 
ceived a signal from the Deputy Quartermaster- 
General to tranship all my corps, stores, etc., 
from the Hymettus to the DundreJinon, a trans- 
port tying half a mile or more away. On receipt 
of this message I signalled back and asked for 
tugs and lighters to enable us to effect the 
transfer, but, although my signallers endeav- 
oured for hours to attract the attention of those 
on the staff ship, I entirely failed to get any 
reply. I finally tried to extort a response of 
some sort by sending an ire-raising message to 

[68] 



ARRIVAL AT LEMNOS 

the effect that on investigation, I found that 
many of the men and mules could not swim! 
But my sarcasm was wasted, for the Arcadian 
remained dumb. 

This failure in the signalling arrangements 
was very marked all through the two or three 
days we spent at Lemnos. It was practically 
impossible to get any message through, and one 
felt completely cut off from all communication 
with the staff ship. There were no arrange- 
ments for getting about in the harbour. The 
ship's small boats would have been swamped in 
the heavy sea, and it was practically impossible 
to secure a launch. 

This failure, together with the wretched sig- 
nalling arrangements, gave me serious qualms, 
and I could not help wondering if the muddle 
ceased here, or did it extend to other and more 
grave matters which would imperil the success 
of the expedition? 

All day long I was anxiously on the look-out 
for a tug and lighters to enable me to tranship 
to the Dundrennon, and at last, at about 6 p. m., 
I saw a little trawler, towing a string of half a 
dozen lighters, making her way up the harbour 
towards us. In a few minutes they were along- 
side and made fast to the Hymettus, but, alas! 

[69] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

I soon discovered that, altliougli the lighters 
were for us, the tug was about to sail away 
again. The only order the commander had re- 
ceived was to bring the lighters alongside and 
make them fast to the Ili/mctius, and there his 
task ended. This was a blow to me, for I felt 
that, if the little Jcsme went off, I and my Corps 
would be left high and dry on the Lemnos mud, 
while the rest of the Expedition sailed off next 
morning on the great adventure! Luckily, the 
commander of the Jessie was a friend of the Cap- 
tain's and came on board for a yarn. After a 
few moments I followed him to the Captain's 
cabin and, on being introduced, fomid that he 
was ]\Ir. A. R. jNIurley. I soon discovered that 
he was a most exceptional man in every way, 
and a sailor to his linger tips. He had been 
Chief Officer on board a large liner, but had re- 
signed his post to volunteer his services to the 
Admiralty for the war, and, although the posi- 
tion he now held as skipper of the Jessie was a 
very small one compared with his last charge, 
yet, as he sportingly said, what did it matter so 
long as he was usefully doing his bit? — and I be- 
lieve he was as proud of the Jessie as if she had 
been a liner or a battleship. 

I used all my eloquence on ]Mr. Murley, 
[:o] 



ARRIVAL AT LEMXOS 

pointed out what a desperate position I was in, 
and said that if he did not conne to my aid we 
would, indeed, be hopelessly stranded. The 
Captain of the Ilymettus, who, by the way, was 
naturally very much upset at having struck this 
uncharted mudbank, ably seconded my appeal, 
and although Murley had been working from 
dawn and had intended to return to his depot 
to lay in stores of coal, water and oil, to enable 
him to start with the expedition at five o'clock 
in the morning, he agreed to work for me 
throughout the night. 



[71] 



CHAPTER VI 

A STRENUOUS NIGHT 

Having once obtained INIurley's consent I flew 
off and got officers and men told off in reliefs, 
some to work on the loading up of the lighters, 
others to go with the mules to the Dundren- 
non and remain there to ship and stow away- 
each load as it came over during the night. 

There were six lighters, and as soon as three 
were filled, IMurley got the httle Jessie hitched 
on and towed them off to the Dimdrennon. 
It was a joy to watch the masterly way in 
which he handled his tug and manoeuvred the 
tow of lighters into the exact position where 
they were required alongside the Dundrennon. 
Never did I see an error of judgment made, and 
everything that JNIurley had to do went hke 
clockwork. He had a clear and pleasant word 
of command, which rang out like a bell, and al- 
though he was "a hustler" his men never re- 
sented it; first of all, because they knew he was 
top-hole at his job and, secondly, because he 
was extraordinarily tactful. Tow after tow 

[72] 



A STRENUOUS NIGHT 

went back and forth throughout the night — 
three full lighters to the Dundrennon and three 
empty ones back to the Hymettus — and didn't 
we just hustle those mules into the boats, and 
didn't they kick and bite as they felt the slings 
go round them to hoist them aloft! It would 
have taken us too long had we only slung 
one mule at a time, so we hoisted them in cou- 
ples! The comical sight the brace of mules 
presented, as they were whipped off their legs 
and swung up into the gloom, can well be imag- 
ined. They kicked and plunged as they were 
passed over the side and lowered down into the 
inky murkiness of the lighters, where they were 
caught and secured at much risk by men wait- 
ing there for the purpose. Heaven only knows 
how they escaped injury, for they had a very 
rough time of it before they were comfortably 
stowed away in their new quarters on the 
Dundrennon. I was quite prepared to hear of 
several casualties among both men and mules, 
but the mule is a hardy beast, and the Zionist 
can stand a lot of knocking about, and we had 
not a single man or animal injured. 

We were exceptionally fortunate in finding 
on board the Dundrennon part of an Indian 
Mule Corps for service with the New Zealanders, 

[73] 



WITH THE ZIOXISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

conmiandcd by Captain Alexander, and I can- 
not be sufficiently grateful to him for the way 
in which he set his men to work and helped us to 
put away and tie up our equipment and mules. 

I cannot say so nmch for the help given me by 
the Captain of the Dunihrnuon, who was rather 
a rough customer, and curtly informed me that 
he had orders to sail at five o'clock a. m. sharp, 
and that, whether I was aboard or not, he meant 
to weigh anchor at that hour. 

xVll night long we worked feverishly, slinging 
and unslinging with all possible haste, and while 
I was using everybody up to breaking point in 
my efforts to get through in time. Captain Ed- 
munds, who was in charge of the medical stores 
for the Australians and New Zealanders, came 
up to me and told me of the hopeless plight in 
which he was placed. The Director of INIedical 
Services had ordered him to get himself, his men 
and his stores as quickly as possible on board the 
Anglo-Egyptian, but here again no means were 
supplied to enable the order to be carried out. 
'T can hardly dare appeal to you," he continued, 
"to get me out of my difficulties, for I can see 
that you will hardly get yom* own lot transferred 
before five o'clock." I asked him if it was very 
necessary that he should be put aboard, and he 



A STRENUOUS NIGHT 

told me that, so far as he knew, his were the only 
hospital stores available for the Australians and 
New Zealanders. 

This was a very grave matter, and although 
I was very loth to give up all chance of complet- 
ing the transfer of my own Corps within the 
time limit, yet I felt that this was a case which, 
at all hazards to my own fortunes, must be seen 
through, so that our gallant comrades from 
Australia and New Zealand might not lack the 
medical necessities which I knew would be re- 
quired the moment they got into action. 

I, therefore, turned my men on to loading up 
the hospital stores, and, when all was ready, 
Murley towed us across to the Anglo-Egyptian, 
where I eventually saw Captain Edmunds, his 
staff of R. A. M. C. men and his stores safely 
on board. 

Some months afterwards Gye received a let- 
ter from Captain Edmunds, written from 
Anzac, in which he stated: "Remember me to 
Colonel Patterson and tell him from me that 
being able to get those stores on to the Anglo- 
Egyptian averted what would have been an ap- 
palling calamity from a medical point of view, 
as I do not know what this place would have 
done without my stores the first two days." 

[75] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GAIJ.irOIJ 

So I think that AustniHji anil New Zoalaiul 
owe 1110 Olio tor the holp I i^avo thoiii on that 
strenuous night of April 'JUh, Avhon 1 was bur- 
ioil up to the nook in work of my own. It was 
a groat strain on my footings of duty to risk 
being ki*t stuok on tlie mud. but I realised at tlie 
time tliat I was doing not only what was right, 
but what was essential from a military point of 
view: and when I road that letter from Kd- 
iiiunds. 1 felt very glad that I had risen to the 
oooasion aiul had put the needs o^ the Austra- 
lians and New Zealandors before my own. 

By the time that the transfer was eompleted 
it was 8.30 a. yi., and I then knew that I eould 
not possibly get the remainder of my Zionists, 
mules, equipment ami stores transferred to the 
Dundrcnnon by the time she was sehodulod to 
sail. I, therefore, went to the Captain and laid 
my ease before him, pointing out that it was im- 
possible to got everything transferred in time 
and asking him would he delay sailing until >ve 
were aboard. I have saiil that he was rather a 
rough type of man. Having been for many 
years master of a tramp steamer, ho had spent 
his life dealing with rough men and doing rough 
work. I have, tlioroforo. no doubt that he 
thought he was answering me in quite a oivil and 



A STIiKXrjOUS NIGHT 

polite way when lie told rue he wfmJd sec me 
damned before he delayed his ship five minutes. 

J then asked my ^ood friend the skipper of 
the Jennie if he would ruw me down to the staff 
ship, as I hoped to he able to get a written order 
from somebody there, to the Captain of the Dun- 
drennon, cancelling the sailing at 5 a, m. until 
such time as I would have my unit complete on 
board. 

Off we sailed, threading our way in the dark 
through such of the few warships and transport 
vessels as had not yet sailed, and just before four 
o'clock I found myself knocking at the cabin 
door of a Naval Officer. After rapping for 
some time, he called out "Come in," but the door 
was locked, so he was obliged to get up to let me 
in, and I am not surprised that his greeting to 
me was not exactly one of brotherly love. 
When I told him of my position and asked him 
to give me an order delaying the departure of 
the Dundrennon, he flatly refused to do it, and 
said that the hours of departure of the ships were 
fixed and that he was not the man to change the 
order: I would have to go to the Captain of H. 
M. S. Hussar, who was the man actually re- 
sponsible for the sailings. I pointed out to him 
that by the time I reached the Hussar, which was 

[77] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

still further off, and got at the Captahi, and then 
made my way back to the Dundrennon, it would 
be long after five o'clock, and there would be no 
Diindrcnnon there, for the ship would have 
sailed! I urged that in a special case of this 
kind I hoped he would over-rule the Time-table. 
He was, however, most obdurate, and told me it 
was useless for me to argue with him any longer. 
When I pointed out to him that I had only re- 
ceived means of transferring my Corps late the 
previous evening, and that we had been working 
all through the night, he snapped at me and said, 
"Why do you make such a fuss about having 
worked all through the night? That is noth- 
ing." I quietl}'^ told him that I had once or 
twice in my life worked all night without making 
any fuss about it, and that I had merely wished 
to impress upon him that it was not through any 
fault or slackness on my part that the transfer 
could not be completed in time. He was not 
mollified, however, and practically marched me 
off to the gangway, where he turned about and 
made for his cabin. But I was not to be so 
easily shaken off, so I promptly turned about 
also and pursued him. I pointed out to him 
emphatically that, unless he gave me this order, 
on him would rest the entire responsibility of 

[78] 



A STRENUOUS NIGHT 

leaving the 29th Division in the lurch, as I 
remarked that my Corps was the only one to 
take them up food and water, and that if they 
died of thirst he would be entirely to blame. 
"What is the good of sending off the Dundren- 
non," I asked, "unless she has on board the Corps 
upon which so much depends? What will be 
said hereafter if you let the 29th Division die of 
thirst?" 

This last appeal moved the naval man's 
bowels of compassion; so without more ado he 
had the office opened up, and wrote out an of- 
ficial order delaying the sailing of the Dundren- 
non until 8 o'clock. When I told him also that 
the master of the Dundrennon was not very 
helpful he at once wrote a curt note to him as 
follows : 

"I hear that you are not aiding Colonel Pat- 
terson in his embarkation as much as you might. 
You had better do so." 

I kept this note for emergency, in case the 
master of the Dundrennon might prove obstrep- 
erous, but I had no occasion to use it. 

I was delighted with my success, and so was 
Murley, who was with me all the time I was en- 
deavouring to persuade the naval man to order 
this very necessary delay. It was of course no 

[79] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

light thing to take upon himself the responsi- 
hihty of altering the Time-table. I can only 
say to him "Well done." We got back to the 
Dundrennon at a quarter to five and were 
greeted by the wrathful skipper, who was up and 
preparing his ship for a punctual start. I 
shouted up to him: "I have an order cancelling 
your saihng until eight o'clock. Do you want 
to see it?" "I do," was the gruff response. 
"Pass it up on this rope," throwing a line aboard 
the Jessie, I stuck the order between the 
strands of the rope and the skipper hauled it up, 
and as he read it he uttered highly flavoured 
maledictions on all naval and army men, without 
showing any undue partiality for either! 

Now I was very glad that things had turned 
out so happily, but even if I had not obtained the 
order for the delay of the Dundrennon, I still 
had a trump card up my sleeve, which I had 
only intended to play in the last resort, namely, 
to have seized the anchor winch and, at all costs, 
have prevented any sailor from approaching it 
until I gave orders that they might do so. I had 
put fifty armed men on board ship, whom I was 
prepared to use for this purpose in case of ne- 
cessity, as I was determined that I should go to 
GalHpoU complete, e\en at the risk of seizing 

[80] 



A STRENUOUS NIGHT 

the ship and being, later on, tried for piracy on 
the high seas ! 

This reminds me of an incident which hap- 
pened in the South African War when I had to 
resort to ahnost similar methods. I was given 
orders to entrain my squadron instantly at 
Bloemfontein, but instead of being sent north 
we were merely shunted into the Station siding, 
where we had to remain for the best part of 
twenty-four hours without any chance of water- 
ing our horses. We started some time in the 
night, and at daybreak the train was halted at a 
siding where there was a stream running close 
by. I looked at my horses and found many of 
them down, owing to fatigue and want of water, 
so I ordered the men to unbox them and take 
them to water at the stream. When the guard 
saw this he strongly objected, saying that the 
train that was coming down might pass through 
at any moment, and that, as soon as it had 
passed, he would proceed on his way to Johan- 
nesburg, whether the horses were back in the 
boxes or not. I said: ''Will you?" and he re- 
plied: "Yes, I will. I am in charge of this 
train and I am going to push on." 

I thereupon called up the Sergeant-Major, 
whispered an order to him, and in two seconds 

[81] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

that guard found himself a prisoner on the plat- 
form with a soldier on each side of him, with 
orders to hold him fast in case he made any at- 
tempt to get away. The watering was quietly 
and expeditiously proceeded with, and mean- 
while the down train passed through. 

Our engine driver came along the platform to 
see what was the matter and I overheard the 
guard telling him to proceed at once, even if he, 
the guard, were left hehind. I asked the di-iver 
if he meant to carry out the guard's instructions 
and he replied: "Yes." I then said: "Ser- 
geant-3Iajor, two more men! make this driver a 
prisoner." 

When the waterhig of the horses was over I 
released my prisoners and told them they could 
now go on. The driver refused. I said: ''All 
right, then. I will drive myself." The look of 
astonishment that came over the driver's face 
when he saw me mount the footplate, contidently 
put my hand on the lever and start the train, was 
something to be remembered. He immediately 
caved in, jumped up and resmned his duties, 
without more ado. Some time afterwards I 
heard that the guard made a bitter complaint 
of my high-handedness, which eventually came 
before (reneral Tucker, then conmianding at 

[ S'3 ] 



A STRENUOUS NIGHT 

Bloemfontein, and it was a satisfaction to me 
to learn that the General emphasised his ap- 
proval of what I had done in one of his choicest 
expressions. 

Even with the extension of the time limit, I 
felt that it would be a close thing if we were to 
get everything on board the Dundrennon by 
eight o'clock, so we all worked with feverish 
energy, and it was only by a great spurt on the 
part of the Jessie that we finally got our last 
three lighters, loaded to their utmost capacity, 
made fast to the Dundrenno7i just before eight 
o'clock. I knew that it would still take a good 
hour to get everything aboard, so, drawing ^lur- 
ley aside, I suggested to him that he must be in 
need of a little refreshment after his strenuous 
night, and that if he were to go to the skipper's 
cabin he could, I felt sure, comit on him to pro- 
duce a bottle — and I added: "Make sure that 
he does not come out until I give you the signal." 

Murlej' laughingly undertook this congenial 
task, and when, after everything had been 
stowed away, I eventually joined them at 9:10 
A. M., I found the skipper thoroughly enjoying 
himself and laughing heartily at one of JNIurley's 
impromptu yams. Bravo, INIurley! If I am 
ever ruler of the "King's Navee" — and stranger 

[83] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

things have happened — you may be sure that 
you will be appointed an Admiral of the Fleet I 

I don't know how to find you, but if these 
lines ever come under your eye, remember that 
dinner that you are to have with me in London, 
and it shall be of the best, JNIurley, of the very 
best. 

I found, after all, that the old skipper's bark 
was worse than his bite. He thawed towards 
me to such an extent that, when I parted from 
him at Gallipoli, he sped me on my way with a 
present of two precious bottles of his best 
whisky! — sign manual of his having taken me 
to his rugged but withal kindly old heart. 



[84] 



CHAPTER VII 

DESCRIPTION OF SOUTHERN GALLIPOLI 

As I shall have to mention several places in 
Gallipoli, it may be well before proceeding 
further to give the reader some idea of the geog- 
raphy of the place. 

Gallipoli is a narrow, hilly peninsula, varying 
from three to twelve miles wide, running south- 
westward into the JEgean Sea, with the Darda- 
nelles, from one to four miles wide, separating it 
from the Asiatic coast throughout its length of 
some forty miles. 

As I am going to speak more particularly of 
the southern end of the Peninsula, I will only 
describe that portion of it, as it was here that 
the 29th Division landed, and the Zion Mule 
Corps worked. 

The dominating feature is the hill of Achi 
Baba, some seven hundred feet high, which, with 
its shoulders sloping down on the one side to the 
'^gean and on the other to the Dardanelles, 
shuts out all further view of the Peninsula to the 
northward. There are only two villages in this 

[85] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

area, Sedd-el-Balir at the entrance to the Darda- 
nelles, and Krithia, with its quaint windmills, to 
the southwest of Achi Baba, somewhat pictm*- 
esquely situated on the slope of a spur, some five 
miles northwest of Sedd-el-Bahr — Achi Baba it- 
self being between six and seven miles from 
Cape Ilelles, which is the most southerly pohit 
of the Peninsula. 

A line through Achi Baba from the ^Egean 
to the Dardanelles would be a little over five 
miles, while the width at Ilclles is only about one 
and a half miles. 

A fairly good representation of this tract of 
country will be obtained by holding the right- 
hand pahii upward and slightly hollowed, the 
thumb pressed a little over the forefinger. 
Imagine the Dardanelles running along by the 
little finger up the arm, and the /Egean Sea on 
the tlnmib side. ^lorto Bay, an inlet of the 
Dardanelles, would then be at about the tip of a 
short little finger; Sedd-el-Bahr Castle at the 
tip of the third finger; V Beach between 
the third finger and the middle finger; Cape 
Helles the tip of the middle finger ; W Beach be- 
tween the middle finger and the fore-finger; X 
Beach at the base of the nail of the forefinger; 
Gully Beach between the tip of the thimib and 

[86] 



SOUTHERN GALLIPOLI 

the forefinger; Gully Ravine running up be- 
tween the thumb and forefinger towards Krithia 
village, which is situated half-way up to the 
thumb socket; Y Beach at the first joint of the 
thumb; and Achi Baba in the centre of the heel 
of the hand where it joins the wrist. 

Anzac, where the Australians and New Zea- 
landers landed, would be some distance above the 
wrist on the thumb side of the forearm; and 
the Narrows of the Dardanelles would be on the 
inner or little finger side of the forearm op- 
posite Anzac. 

Imagine the sea itself lapping the lower part 
of the hand on a level with the finger-nails, and 
then the cliffs will be represented by the rise 
from the finger-nails to the balls of the fingers. 

The hollowed hand gives a very good idea of 
the appearance of the country, which gradually 
slopes down to a valley represented by the palm 
of the hand. The lines on the hand represent 
the many ravines and watercourses which inter- 
sect the ground. 

Practically the whole of this basin drains into 
Morto Bay or the Dardanelles, with the excep- 
tion of Gully Ravine and the ravine running 
down to Y Beach, which drain into the ^Egean 
Sea. 

[87] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

A glance at the "handy" sketch will make 
everything clear, but it does not pretend to strict 
accuracy. 



[88] 



CHAPTER VIII 

A HOMERIC CONFLICT 

MuDEOS Harbour was deserted as we sailed 
through it on our way out, for all the warships 
and transports had already left. Just beyond 
the harbour entrance we passed the Anglo- 
Egyptian, on the decks of which the other half 
of the Zionists were crowded. We wondered 
what had happened to detain her, for she was 
lying at anchor; but we saw nothing amiss, and 
lusty cheers were given and received as we 
steamed past. 

When we had rounded the land which guards 
the entrance to the harbour, the Dundrennon 
turned her bows northeastward and we steamed 
off towards the land of our hopes and fears, 
through a calm sea, which sparkled gaily in the 
sunshine. The soft zephyr which followed us 
from the south, changed suddenly and came 
from the northeast, bringing with it the sound 
of battle from afar. The dull boom of the guns 
could now be plainly heard and told us that the 
great adventure had already begun. How we 

[89] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

all wished that the Dundrcnnon were a grey- 
hound of the seas and could rush us speedily to 
the scene of such epoch-making events! But, 
alas! she was only a slow old tramp, and going 
"all out" she could do no more than twelve knots 
an hour; and it seemed an eternity before we 
actually came close enough to see anything of 
the great drama which was being enacted. 

As we ploughed along the calm sea, to the 
slow beat of the engines, each hour seemed a cen- 
tury, but at last we were able to distinguish the 
misty outline of the Asiatic shore and, a little 
later on, we saw, coming to meet us like an out- 
stretched arm and hand, a land fringed and half- 
hidden by the fire and smoke which enveloped it 
as if some great magician had summoned the 
powers of darkness to aid in its defence. 

Soon battleships, cruisers and destroyers be- 
gan to outline themselves, and every few min- 
utes we could see them enveloped in a sheet of 
flame and smoke, as they poured their broadsides 
into the Turkish positions. The roar of the 
Queen Elizabeth's heavj guns dwarfed all other 
sounds, as this leviathan launched her huge pro- 
jectiles — surely mightier thunderbolts than Jove 
ever hurled — against the foe. Every now and 
again one of her shells would strike and burst on 

[90] 



A HOMERIC COXFLICT 

the very crest of Achi Baba, which then, as it 
belched forth flame, smoke and great chunks of 
the hill itself, vividly recalled to my mind Ve- 
suvius in a rage. 

The whole scene was a sight for the gods, and 
those of us mortals who witnessed it and sur- 
vived the day have forever stamped on our 
minds the most wonderful spectacle that the 
world has ever seen. Half the nations of the 
earth were gathered there in a titanic struggle. 
England, with her children from Australia and 
New Zealand, and fellow subjects from India; 
sons of France, with their fellow citizens from 
Algeria and Senegal; Russian sailors and Rus- 
sian soldiers; Turks and Germans — all fighting 
within our vision, some in Europe and some in 
Asia. 

Nor did the wonders end here, for, circling the 
heavens like soaring eagles, were French and 
British aeroplanes, while, under the sea, lurked 
the deadly submarine. 

It was altogether in the fitness of things that 
this Homeric conflict should have its setting 
within sight of the classic Plains of Troy. 

Who will be the modern Homer to immortal- 
ise the deeds done this day — deeds beside which 
those performed by Achilles, Hector and the 

[91] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

other heroes of Greece and Troy pale into utter 
msigniticance ? Certainly a far greater feat of 
arms was enacted in Gallipoli on this 25th of 
April, 1915, than was ever performed by those 
ancient heroes on the Plains of Ilium, which lay 
calm, green and smiHng just across the sparkling 
Hellespont. 

Up the Dardanelles, as far as the Narrows, 
we could see our ships of war, principally de- 
stroyers, blazing away merrily and indiscrmii- 
nately at the guns, both on the European and 
Asiatic shores. The sea was as calm as a mill- 
pond round Cape Helles — the most southerly 
point of the Peninsula ; the only ripple to be seen 
was that made by the strong cm*rent shot out 
through the Straits. All romid the men-of-war 
Turkish shells were dropping, sending up veri- 
table waterspouts as they struck the sea, for, 
luckily, very few of them hit the ships. It was 
altogether the most imposing and awe-inspiring 
sight that I have ever seen or am likely to see 
again. 

We were under orders to disembark, when 
our turn came, at V Beach, a little cove to the 
east of Cape Helles. As we approached near to 
our landing-place, we could see through the haze, 
smoke and dust, the gleam of bayonets, as men 

[92] 



A HOMERIC CONFLICT 

swayed and moved hither and thither in the 
course of the fight, while the roar of cannon and 
the rattle of the machine-guns and rifles were 
absolutely deafening. We could well imagine 
what a veritable hell our brave fellows who were 
attacking this formidable position must be fac- 
ing, for, in addition to rifle and machine-gun fire 
from the surrounding cliffs, they were also at 
times under a deadly cannonade from the Turk- 
ish batteries established on the Asiatic shore. 

The warships were slowly moving up and 
down the coast blazing away fiercely at the 
Turkish strongholds, battering such of them as 
were left into unrecognisable ruins. 

We in the transports lay off the shore in four 
parallel lines, each successive line going forward 
methodically and disembarking the units on 
board as the ground was made good by the land- 
ing parties. 

We watched the fight from our position in the 
line for the whole of that day, and never was ex- 
citement so intense and long-sustained as during 
those hours; nor was it lessened when night fell 
upon us, for the roll of battle still continued — 
made all the grander by the vivid flashes from 
the guns which, every few moments, shot forth 
great spurts of flame, brilliantly illuminating 

[93] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

the ink}^ darkness. Sedd-el-Bahr Castle and 
the village nestling behind it were fiercely ablaze, 
and cast a ruddy glare on the sky. 

The next day, from a position much closer 
inshore, we watched again the terrible struggle 
of the landing-parties to obtain a grip on the 
coast. We were one and all feverish with 
anxiety to land and do something — no matter 
how little — to help the gallant fellows who were 
strivhig so heroically to drive the Turk from the 
strong positions which he had carefully fortified 
and strengthened in every possible way. 

A most bloody battle was taking place, staged 
in a perfect natural amphitheatre, but never had 
Imperial Rome, even in the days of Nero him- 
self, gazed upon such a corpse-strewn, blood- 
drenched arena. 

This arena was formed partly by the sea, 
which has here taken a semicircular bite out of 
the rocky coast, and partly by a narrow strip of 
beach which extended back for about a dozen 
yards to a low rampart formed of sand, some 
three or four feet high, which ran round the bay. 
Behind this rampart the ground rose steeply up- 
wards, in tier after tier of grassy slopes, to a 
height of about 100 feet, where it was crowned 
by some ruined Turkish barracks. On the right, 

[9-i] 



A HOMERIC CONFLICT 

this natural theatre was flanked by the old castle 
of Sedd-el-Bahr, whose battlements and towers 
were even then crumbling down from the effects 
of the recent bombardment by the Fleet. To 
the left of the arena, high cliffs rose sheer from 
the sea, crowned by a modern redoubt. Barbed 
wire zig-zagged and criss-crossed through arena 
and amphitheatre — and such barbed wire! It 
was twice as thick, strong and formidable as any 
I had ever seen. 

The cliffs and galleries were trenched and full 
of riflemen, as were also the barracks, the ruined 
fort, and Sedd-el-Behr Castle. Machine-guns 
and pom-poms were everywhere, all ready to 
pour a withering fire on any one approaching or 
attempting to land on the beach. 

It is small wonder, therefore, that so few 
escaped from that terrible arena of death. In- 
deed, the wonder is that any one survived that 
awful ordeal. 

The little cove was peaceable enough on the 
morning of the 25th, when the Transport River 
Clyde steamed in. It was part of the scheme to 
run her ashore at this beach and, as it was known 
that the venture would be a desperate one, what 
was more fitting than that she should be filled 
with Irish soldiers (the Dublins and Munsters) 

[95] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

— regiments with great fighting records? With 
them was also half a hattalion of the Hampshire 
Regiment. Special preparations had been made 
to disembark the troops as qnickly as possible. 
Great holes had been cut in the iron sides of the 
Ixivcr Cli/ih\ and from these gangways made of 
j)lanking, which were of course lashed to the 
ship, sloped down in tiers to the water's edge. 
From tlie ends of these gangways a string of 
lighters stretched to the shore to enable the men 
to rush quickly to land. 

In addition to those on the liivcr CJi/dc, three 
companies of the Dublin Fusiliers were towed 
to the beach in open boats and barges bj'^ little 
steam pinnaces. It had been intended that 
these should steal in during the dark hours just 
before dawn, but, owing to miscalculations of 
the speed of the current, or some other cause, 
the boats did not arrive in time and only reached 
the shore at the same moment that Conmiander 
Unwin, R. N., of the Eivcj- Clyde, according to 
the prearranged plan, coolly ran his vessel 
aground. This mananivre must have greatly as- 
tonished the Turks, but not a sound or move did 
they make, and it seemed at first as if the land- 
ing would not be opposed. As soon, however, 
as the ]\Imisters began to pour from her sides, 

[96] 



A HOMERIC CONFLICT 

a perfect hail of lead ojjened on the unfortunate 
soldiers, who were shot down in scores as they; 
raced down the gangway. Some who were 
struck in the leg stumbled and fell into the water, 
where, owing to the weight of their packs and 
ammunition, they went to the bottom and were 
drowned. For days afterwards these unfor- 
tunate men could be seen through the clear 
water, many of them still grasjjing their rifles. 

The men in the boats suffered equally heavily 
and had even less chance of escape. Many were 
mown down by rifle fire and sometimes a shell 
cut a boat in two and the unfortunate soldiers 
went to the bottom, carried down by the weight 
of their equipment. 

The sailors who were detailed to assist in the 
landing performed some heroic deeds. Theirs 
was the task of fixing the lighters from the gang- 
ways of the River Clyde to the shore. Even in 
ordinary times it would be a very difficult task, 
owing to the strong current which sweeps round 
from the Dardanelles, but to do it practically at 
the muzzle of the enemy's rifles demanded men 
with the hearts of lions. Scores were shot down 
as they tugged and hauled to get the lighters 
into position. Scores more were ready to jump 
into their places. More than once the lighters 

[97] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLirOLl 

broke loose and the whole perilous Avork had to 
be done over again, but our gallant seamen 
never failed. They just "carried on." 

Connnander (now Captain") f^nwin was 
awarded the Victoria Cross l\n* fearlessly risking 
his life on more than one occasion in endeavoin-- 
ing to keep the lighters in position under the 
pitiless hail of lead. 

Those naval men whose duty it was to bring 
the Dublins ashore in small boats were shot down 
to a man, for there was no escape for them from 
that terrible iire. Both boats and crew were de- 
stroyed, either on the beach, or before they 
reached it. 

In spite of the rain of death some of the Dub- 
lins and ^lunsters succeeded in elfecting a land- 
ing and making a dash for shelter from the tor- 
nado of tire under the little ridge of sand which, 
as I have already mentioned, ran round the 
beach. Had the Turks taken the precaution of 
levelling this bank of sand, not a stud could have 
lived in that lire-swept zone. ]More than half 
of the landing-party were killed before they 
coidd reach its friendly shelter and many others 
were left writhing in agony on that narrow strip 
of beach. Brigadier-General Napier and his 
Brigade jNIajor, Captain Costeker, were killed, 

[ 9S ] 



A HOMERIC COXFLICT 

as was also Lieut. -Colonel Carririgton Smith, 
commanding the Ilampshires; the Adjutants of 
the Ilampshires and of the Munsters were 
wounded and, indeed, the great majority of the 
senior officers were either wounded or killed. 

Many anxious eyes were peering out over the 
protected bulwarks of the River Clyde, and 
among them was Father Finn, the Roman Cath- 
olic Chaplain of the Dublins. The sight of 
some five hundred of his brave boys lying dead 
or dying on that terrible strip of beach was too 
much for him, so, heedless of all risk, he plunged 
down the gangway and made for the shore. On 
the way, his wrist was shattered by a bullet, but 
he went on, and although lead was spattering all 
round him like hailstones, he administered con- 
solation to the wounded and dying, who, alas! 
were so thickly strewn around. For a time he 
seemed to Have had some miraculous form of 
Divine protection, for he went from one to an- 
other through shot and shell without receiving 
any further injurj'. At last a bullet struck him 
near the hip, and, on seeing this, some of the 
Dublins rushed out from the protection of the 
sandbank and brought him into its shelter. 
When, however, he had somewhat recovered 
from his wound, nothing would induce him to 

[99] 



remain in safety while his poor boys were being 
done to death in the open, so out he crawled 
again to administer comfort to a poor fellow 
who was moaning piteously a little way off; and 
as he was in the act of giving consolation to the 
stricken man, this heroic Chaplain was struck 
dead by a merciful bullet. 

Father Finn has, so far, been granted no V. 
C, but if there is such a thing in heaven, I am 
sure he is wearing it, and His Holiness Benedict 
XV might do worse than canonise this heroic 
priest, for sm'ely no saint ever died more nobly: 
*' Greater love hath no man than this, that a man 
lay down his life for his friends." 

The Turkish position was so strong and they 
were able to pour down such a concentrated fire 
from pit, box, di-ess-circle, and gallery of their 
natural theatre, that every man of these gallant 
Irish regiments who showed himself in the open 
was instantly struck down. So hot and accurate 
was this close range Turkish fire that the dis- 
embarkation from the River Clyde had to be dis- 
continued. 

The little body of men who had escaped death 
and ensconced themselves under the sandbank 
kept up a lively fire on the Turks as long as their 
ammunition lasted, but there they had to remain 

[100] 



A HOMERIC CONFLICT 

for the best part of thirty-six hours, more or 
less at the mercy of the enemy. An attempt 
to dislodge them was, however, easily repelled by 
jSre from the warships, as well as from the 
machine-guns on the decks of the River Clyde. 

It was not until after nightfall that the re- 
mainder of the Irishmen could disembark, and 
then all the units had to be reorganised to enable 
them to make an attack on the formidable Turk- 
ish trenches on the following morning. 

Practically every officer of the Dublins and 
Munsters was either killed or wounded, very few 
escaped scot free. The Dublins were particu- 
larly unfortunate, for at another landing-place. 
Camber Beach, close by Sedd-el-Bahr village, 
out of 125 men landed, only 25 were left at mid- 
day. Nevertheless, the fragments of the two 
battalions were pulled together by Lieut.-Colo- 
nel Doughty- Wylie and Lieut.-Colonel Wil- 
liams, assisted by Captain Walford, R. A., Bri- 
gade Major. It will be readily understood what 
an arduous task it was to reorganise men who for 
over twenty-four hours had been subjected to 
the most murderous and incessant fire that ever 
troops had had to face ; but nothing is impossible 
when really determined men make up their 
minds that it must be done, and early morning 

[101] 



of the 20th April found the Dubhiis and Mun- 
sters and some of the Ilampshires, led by 
Doughty-Wylie and Walford, dashing at the 
Turkish trenches, which they carried at the point 
of the bayonet. They rushed position after posi- 
tion, and by noon Sedd-el-Bahr village was in 
our hands, and here the gallant AValford was 
killed. Sedd-el-Bahr Castle yet remained to be 
taken, and it was while leading the linal attack 
on the keep of this stronghold that the heroic 
Colonel Doughty-Wylie fell, mortally wounded, 
at the moment of victory. The posthumous 
honour of the Victoria Cross was granted to these 
two officers to commemorate their glorious deeds. 
At the other landing-places the fighting had 
also been very lierce. At W Beach the Lan- 
cashire Fusiliers had a terribly difficult task in 
storming an abnost impregnable position, which 
had been carefully prepared beforehand by the 
Turks. The high ground overlooking the beach 
had been strongly fortified with trenches; land 
mines and sea mines had been laid; wire en- 
tanglements extended round the shore and a 
barbed network had also been placed in the shal- 
low water. Like V Beach it was a veritable 
death trap, but the brave Lancashires, after suf- 
fering terrible losses, succeeded in making good 

[102] 



A HOMERIC CONFLICT 

the landing and drove the Turks out of their 
trenches. In commemoration of their gallantry 
this Beach was afterwards known as Lancashire 
Landing. 

The 2nd Battalion South Wales Borderers 
under Colonel Casson were able to land at S 
Beach, Morto Bay, and seize the high ground 
near De Tott's Battery, to which they tena- 
ciously held on until the main body had driven 
the Turks back, when they joined hands with 
the troops from V Beach and continued the ad- 
vance. 

X Beach was stormed by the 1st Battalion 
Royal Fusiliers and part of the Anson Battalion 
Royal Naval Division, who drove before them 
such Turks as they found on the cliffs. They 
were reinforced by two more Battalions of the 
87th Brigade, and after some heavy slogging 
they eventually got into touch with the Lanca- 
shire Fusiliers and Worcesters and so eased the 
pressure on V Beach by threatening the Turkish 
flank. 

The landing on Y Beach was effected by the 
King's Own Scottish Borderers and the Ply- 
mouth Battalion of the Royal Marines. These 
splendid fellows forced their way into Krithia 
village, but want of ammunition and reinforce- 

[103] 



ments obliged thcni to fall back to the beach, 
-where they were almost overwhebiied by the 
enemy and lost more than half their numbers; 
eventually they were compelled to re-embark, but 
not before thev had done inmiense damage to the 
Turks and considerably helped the troops who 
were forcing the other landings. 

^leanwhile the two Australian-New Zealand 
Divisions were engaged in the perilous enter- 
prise of forcing a landing in the face of a large 
Turkish force at a place now known as Anzac 
(this word being formed from the initial letters 
of Australian-New Zealand Army Corps). In 
the dark hour before the dawn some four thou- 
sand of these splendid lighters were towed in 
silence towards the shore, and here again it 
seemed as if they would meet with no opposition ; 
but not so — the Turk was not to be caught nap- 
ping, and, while the boats were still some way 
from land, thousands of Turkish soldiers rushed 
along the strip of beach to intercept the boats, 
and the heavy tire which they opened caused 
very severe casualties in the ranks ; nothing, how- 
ever, could daunt Colonel ]Maclagan and the men 
of the 3rd Australian Brigade; the moment the 
boats touched the shore these dare-devils leaped 
into the water and with irresistible fury drove 

[104] 



A HOMERIC COXFLICT 

the Turks htfort them at the [joint of the bay- 
onet. Xothing could stand up agaiast their on- 
slaught, and by noon, having been reinforced, 
they had "hacked" their way some miles inland, 
put several Krupp guns out of action, and if 
they had been supported by even one more Divi- 
sion, the road to the Narrows would undrAibt- 
edly have been won. As it was, owing to lack 
of sufficient mc^n to hold what they had rriade 
good, they were compelled to retire to the ridges 
overlooking the sea, and there for eight months 
they held the Turks at bay and hurled back, with 
frightful losses, every assault made on their 
position. Oh, if only the 29th Division had also 
been landed here, what a sweex^ing victory we 
would have won! 



[105] 



CHAPTER IX 

THE ZION MULE COEPS LANDS IN GALLIPOLI 

The beach, cliffs and Castle were now in our 
hands, and disembarkation for the remainder of 
the army was possible. While the great battle 
for the landing was going on, we had been fret- 
ting and fuming at being left so long idle spec- 
tators. Thinking that it was high time we 
should disembark, and finding that no orders 
came along for us, I felt that in order to get a 
move on I must make a personal effort. I there- 
fore hailed a trawler which happened to be pass- 
ing, and got it to take me over to the Cornwallis, 
on which I knew General Hunter- Weston, the 
Commander of the 29th Division, had his tem- 
porary headquarters. 

The General was glad to see me, and said I 
had turned up just in the very nick of time, for 
my Zion men were urgently required ashore to 
take ammunition, food and water to the men 
in the firing line. He appealed to Admiral 
Wemyss, who was close by, to detail trawlers 
and lighters to get my Corps ashore as quickly 

[106] 



±±1J1( ZilUlM lViUJL(Jl< L/UHl'O JUi^lMJO 

as possible. The Admiral very kindly told off 
a naval officer to come with me, and he in his 
turn found a trawler and some horse boats which 
were soon alongside the Dundrennon. 

From two to six o'clock p. m. we were busily 
employed loading up and sending mules and 
equipment ashore. I noticed that the officer in 
charge of our trawler was a bit of a bungler at 
his job; time after time he would fail in his judg- 
ment ; when getting the barges alongside he had 
repeatedly to sail round and round the Dundren- 
non with his tow before he got near enough for 
a rope to be cast; he was not a regular naval 
man — just a "dug-out." How I longed then 
for my friend Murley! 

I must say here that in my humble opinion 
the Navy failed us badly in the matter of tugs, 
lighters and horse boats; there were not nearly 
enough of these, and we could have done with 
three times the number. My Corps, which was 
most urgently wanted by the General, took 
three days to disembark, in spite of our most 
strenuous efforts to get ashore as quickly as pos- 
sible. The delay was entirely due to the lack 
of tugs, for it was only now and then that a 
trawler could be spared to haul us inshore. We 
were sadly held up and kept waiting for hours 

[107] 



ft JL A AJ. JL AA J-J ^^J-V^XH JLkJ J. kJ JLXH VJTXl. J_JX-iX X V/X-/X 

after our boats had been loaded up, ready to be 
towed ashore. 

Who was responsible for this shortage I do 
not know. It is, of course, quite possible that 
the Navy provided all the trawlers requisitioned 
for by the Army. 

I had taken the precaution while on the ship 
to fill all my tins with fresh drinking water, and 
these had to be unloaded by hand from the 
lighters. To do this I arranged my men in a 
long line, stretching the whole length of the 
temporary pier from the lighters to the beach, 
and in this manner the cans of water were rap- 
idly passed ashore from hand to hand. 

While we were engaged on this work the guns 
from Asia were making very good shooting, 
shells striking the water within a few yards of 
us, just going over our heads, a little to the right 
or a little to the left, but always just missing. 
I watched my men very carefully to see how they 
would stand their baptism of fire, and I am 
happy to be able to say that, with one solitary 
exception, all appeared quite unconcerned and 
took not the slightest heed of the dangerous 
position they were in. The one exception was a 
youth from the Yemen, who trembled and chat- 
tered with nervousness; but when I went up to 

[108] 



±xxji( Zixwi\ iMUi^rj ^^KJl\Jr:^ i^i\±slj::^ 

him, shook him somewhat ungently, and asked 
him what was the matter, he bent to his work 
and the cans passed merrily along. In fact, 
everybody there, especially the naval men who 
helped us to catch our mules as they jumped 
from the horse boats into the sea, treated the 
cannonade from Asia as a joke, and every time 
a shell missed a hearty laugh went up at the bad 
shooting of the Turkish gunners. It was only a 
mere fluke, however, that the shells did not hit 
the target aimed at, because, as a matter of fact, 
the shooting was particularly good and only 
missed doing a considerable amoimt of damage 
by a few yards each time. We were exceedingly 
fortunate in not losing a single man during the 
whole period of disembarkation. 

Practically the fii'st officer I met as I stepped 
ashore was Colonel Moorehouse, whom I had not 
seen for years, and he was most helpful in the 
present emergency. I found that he was in 
charge of the landing operations on the beach, 
and I believe he had given up a Governorship, 
or some such billet, in West Africa to do his bit 
in the Dardanelles. 

While we were disembarking, General 
d'Amade, who was commanding the French 
Corps Expeditionnaire, stepped ashore and soon 

[109] 



afterwards the French troops began to pour on 
to the beach. 

During the great battle which took place on 
the 25th and 26th for the possession of V Beach, 
the French battleships and gainboats, together 
with the Russian cruiser Ashold, had been bat- 
tering down the fortress of Kum Kale on the 
Asiatic side of the Dardanelles, some two and a 
half miles in a direct line from Sedd-el-Bahr. 

In the face of much opposition the French 
troops forced a landing, and after some hea\y 
fighting defeated the Turks and captured many 
hundi'cds of prisoners. There is no doubt that 
this diversion averted much of the shell fire 
which would otherwise have been concentrated 
on those of us landing at \ Beach. Having 
driven the Tm'ks out and effectively destroyed 
Kum Kale, the French troops were re-embarked 
hurriedly, brought across the Dardanelles, 
landed at V Beach in feverish haste, and flung 
into the thick of the fight which was still raging 
just north of the village of Sedd-el-Bahr. 

I watched them disembark, and it was mag- 
nificent to see the verve and dash which the 
French gunners displayed in getting their be- 
loved .75s into action. 

Our naval men helped to bring the guns 

[110] 



THE ZIOX MULE CORPS LANDS 

ashore, but the moment the Frenchmen got them 
there they had them away and in action on the 
ridge to the north of the amphitheatre in an in- 
credibly short space of time. 

As soon as we had got a couple of hundred 
mules ashore, I was ordered to march them off 
to W Beach, which was on the western side of 
Cape Helles. Having had some experience of 
the ways of soldiers on active service, I knew that 
we should have to keep a very sharp eye on our 
gear as it came ashore, otherwise it would be 
appropriated by the first comer. I therefore 
left Lieutenant Claude Rolo on the beach to look 
after the mules, horses and stores as they were 
disembarked, and incidentally to dodge the shells 
which more than once covered him with sand but 
did no further damage. I had left Lieutenant 
Gye on board the Dundrennon to see to the work 
of loading up the barges. 

On the way to W Beach we were fired on by 
Turkish riflemen who had not as yet been driven 
very far away from the shore, but fortunately 
we sustained no damage. 

The Lancashire Fusilers, as I have already de- 
scribed, had a terribly difficult task in forcing 
their way on to W Beach, and the moment I 
saw it I could well realise what an arduous 

[111] 



WITH TMl^ ZiUiMiSTS IJN l:^Al^i^l±^UJLi 

undertaking it must have been. It looked, like 
V Beach, an impossibility, but the Lancashire 
lads could not be denied, and all honour to them 
for ha^•ing• stormed such a fearsome strong- 
hold. By tlie time I got there there was already 
a huge stock of ammunition and supplies piled 
up on the shore, and these ^ye at once began to 
load up on the mules to take out to the men in 
the firing line, who were constantly driving the 
Turks before them further and further from the 
beach. 

I shall never forget my first night in Gallipoli. 
We loaded up a couple of hundred mules, 
each mule carrying about two thousand car- 
tridges, and with ^lajor O'llara (now Lieut.- 
Colonel O'Hara), who was the D. A. Q. M. G., 
as guide, we marched off into the darkness to dis- 
tribute ammunition along thp front. 

IMajor O'Hara came with me, partly because 
he knew the way, and partly because he wanted 
to make sin*e what were the most urgent needs 
of the men in the trenches. We trudged to- 
gether all through that trying night, so it is not 
much to be wondered at that we almost quar- 
relled once or twice — but I will say here that of 
all the men I met in Gallipoli there was not one 
who was so capable at his job, or worked so hard 

[112] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS LANDS 

to see that everything for which he was responsi- 
ble ran smoothly. Oh, if only our Army could 
be staffed with O 'Haras, what a wonderfully ef- 
ficient machine our Army would be! 

Soon after we left W Beach in the dark it 
began to pour, and it poured and poured solidly 
for about five hours. 

On we squelched through the mud over un- 
known tracks with the water streaming down 
our bodies and running in rivulets out of our 
boots. As soon as the rain ceased a biting cold 
wind set in, which froze us to the marrow. 
However, the vigorous walking, helping up a 
fallen mule, readjusting the loads, getting out 
of holes into which we had tumbled, etc., kept 
our circulation going, and when we arrived at a 
place known as Pink Farm, the furthest point 
to which we had yet advanced, there was a sud- 
den alarm that the Turks were approaching. 
Nobody knew then where our front line was, or 
whether it linked up across the Peninsula. 
There were many gaps in it through which the 
Turks, if they had had initiative enough, might 
have forced their way and inflicted a consider- 
able amount of damage upon us before we could 
have organised adequate resistance. 

On the first alarm of the approaching Turks 

[113] 



I sent a man out to reconnoitre, formed my lit- 
tle escort in open order, prone on the grass, and 
asked ^lajor ^Nloore, D. S. O. of the General 
Stalt', now Brigadier-General INIoore, to hring 
some men from the trenches, if he could tint! 
them, as quickly as possihle, for 1 had no desire 
to lose my convoy at such an early stage of the 
proceedings. 

Gongs could plainly he heard sounding, ap- 
parently close hy, as though it was some prear- 
ranged signal of the enemy, hut whatever the 
reason we sa^v nothing of the Turks, and no at- 
tack was made, so we unloaded our amnumition 
and were then sent hack for more hy CoUmicI B. 
to liancashire Landing. Now Colonel B. of the 
Headquarters Statf told me personally on no 
account to hring hack supplies, hut only amnm- 
nition, as no supplies were needed at this place 
for the present. Unluckily O'PIara was not on 
the spot when Colonel B. gave me these explicit 
and reiterated instructions, so when we got hack 
to the heach he wished to load up supplies, hut 
this I refused to do owing to the specific orders 
I had received. O'Hara was furious but I was 
ohdurate, so, of course, we loaded up with am- 
munition. 

Back again we trudged steadily through rain 

[114] 



TIIK ZiOX MULE COJiPS LANDS 

arifJ slush towards Uie i^rjk i'a/vrj. VV'hf;n wc 
had got ahout half-way, we were irjet by a Staff 
Officer who told us, — to Cj'JIara's great satis- 
faction, — that it was not ammunition which was 
now wanted at the J^ink ]''arm hut supplies. J 
am not at all sure that I did not overhear (J'llara 
call me "an ohstinate damn fool," hut it is as 
well to he hard fjf hearing as it is to possess a 
blind eye on occasions. 

The upshot was that we had to return to the 
beach, unload the ammunition, load up boxes of 
tinned beef, cheese, biscuits and jam, and then 
back again along the "sludgy squdgy" road we 
trudged once more towards that never-to-be-for- 
gotten Pink I'arm. Again we got ahout half- 
way there, when yet another Staff Officer met 
us, who told us that the supplies wcrt not wanted 
by the brigade holding the line at the Pink 
Farm, but by the brigade holding the line on 
the extreme right, where they were urgently re- 
quired, and he ordered us to take tljem there 
without delay. It was now my turn to chuckle, 
and I observed to O'llara that there "really 
must be a damn fool somewhere about after all." 

Without a murmur we turned back once more, 
for, not knowing the country, nor wljere we 
might bump into the enemy, we could rjot take 

[UG] 



Willi TIIJj: ZIUMSTS li\ LrAl^l^irOi^l 

a short cut across, so were forced to return to W 
Beacli. From thence we went along the track 
by the Helles chff which took us to the top of V 
Beach; our route then kxi us through Sedd-el- 
Bahr viUage, where we were warned by a French 
soldier that we would be sniped by Turks as 
there were many still lurking there. 

When we got safely clear of this jimipy place, 
we found ourselves wending our way through 
some Tm-kish cemeteries, the tall, white, thin 
headstones, with their carved headlike top knobs, 
looking exactly like ghosts in the gloomy light. 
We passed through cypress groves, along sandy 
lanes, and rugged paths, fell into and scrambled 
out of dug-outs, ditches and dongas, where 
mules and loads tumbled about indiscriminately 
to the accompaniment of much profanity. 

At one spot on this adventurous journey we 
came upon a Battalion of Zouaves crouching 
down for rest and shelter in the lee of a hedge. 
The sergeant in charge of my escort took them 
for Turks, and only that I was happily on the 
spot when he made this startling discovery, he 
would undoubtedly have opened fire on the 
Frenchmen. I must say that they looked ex- 
actly like Turks, owing to their semi-barbaric 
uniform. 

[116] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS LANDS 

When we got the convoy to where we thought 
the front Hne ought to he, we failed to find it, 
and as we were very hazy as to whether we would 
run into our own men or the Turks, we left the 
convoy under the cover of some trees, and 
OTIara and I went off to reconnoitre. I be- 
lieve we must have passed through a gap in our 
own line. At all events we wandered for some 
time, making many jjauses to listen for any 
sound that might guide us, but the weird thing 
about it was, that the whole place was now still 
as death, though we must have been quite close 
to both armies. No doubt they were dead beat 
after the recent terrific fighting they had come 
through. 

At last we luckily struck our own men, lining 
a shallow trench which had apparently been 
very hastily thrown up, for it scarcely afforded 
enough cover to shelter a decent-sized terrier. 
The men were so exhausted with the continued 
strain and stress of the battle, which had been 
continuous since the morning of the 2oth, that 
they slept as if they were dead. The sentries, 
of course, were on the alert, looking out grim 
and watchful at the Turkish line, which we could 
just make out in the struggling moonlight, ap- 
parently not more than two hundred yards away. 

[117] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Telling the sentinel in a low voice, so as not 
to draw the Tui'kish fii'e, that we had brought up 
a convoy of supplies, and that we were about to 
unload them among some trees a couple of hun- 
di'ed yards further back, we ordered him to pass 
this information on to the Brigade Headquar- 
ters, so that arrangements might be made for the 
distribution of the food before daybreak. 

We then tm*ned back, and taking the nmles 
out of the shelter of the trees where we had left 
them, we brought the supplies as close as pos- 
sible to the firing line, where we stacked them 
mider cover. 

Here again O'Hara's thoroughness and read- 
iness to help in all things came out, for he was 
one of the busiest men in the convoy, helping to 
unload, putting the boxes in order, and remov- 
ing our pack-ropes from the cases, for, of course, 
these always had to be untied and taken back 
with the mules. 

We saw some pathetic sights on our way back 
to W Beach ; we were obliged to stop every now 
and again so as not to bump into the wounded 
men who were being carried down on stretchers 
to the ships all night long by the devoted R. A. 
M. C. orderlies. 

When we topped the crest overlooking W 

[118] 



THE ZION MULE CORPS LANDS 

Beach, a gleam of light was coming up out of 
Asia, telling us of the approach of dawn, and 
we felt, as we wearily strode down the slope to 
the beach, that we had done a hard and useful 
night's work. 

Now, when I had disembarked from the Dun- 
drennon soon after midday, I had no idea that I 
would be hustled off to the trenches at an in- 
stant's notice. I had expected to go back to the 
ship again for at least one more load of mules, 
and I had therefore nothing with me except 
what I stood up in — no food or equipment of 
any kind, and beyond a dry biscuit and some 
cheese, I had had nothing to eat since lunch- 
time, so that it can be well imagined I was fairly 
ravenous when I had finished that night's trek. 
There was no food to be had just yet, however, 
and in any case I had to see to the watering and 
feeding of my mules, for they, like myself, had 
been without food or drink since the previous 
midday. 

This job was finished by about 7 A. m. and 
soon after that I joined O'Hara at an excellent 
breakfast, after which I felt ready for another 
strenuous day. 



[119] 



ciiArrKK X 

A Nunir IT vwv. lUii.v kavinv. 

Feeling greatly ret'resluxl after my breakfast 
with O'lTara, 1 went to seleet a suitable plaee 
for our camp, or rather bivouac, for, of course, 
"Nve had no tents. Fimling a snug little valley 
which stood back a couple o( hundred yards 
from W Beach and which ran up under the pro- 
tection o( a rise in the ground, which gave us 
some slight cover from the Turks, I put all 
hands on to prepare and level the gnnmd for the 
horse and mule lines. 

AVe had been rushed to the trenches in such 
haste with the ammunition and supplies that we 
had been unable to bring any rope with which to 
tether the mules, so, seeing some ship's rope lying 
on the beach, I asked the naval othcer m charge 
to let me have it for my lines. lie not only did 
this, but lent me some of his men as well to carry 
it up to my little camp, where they helped me to 
tix it in the ground. I am sorry to say I forg-et 
this officer's name, as he was most helpful to me 
in many ways, and I never had to appeal in vain 

[uo] 



THE gt;jj.v kavixk 

to him, or, as a umW-.r of fad, to any other navaJ 
oiVicjj' for ahslstarice. 

Throughout the day there was more than 
enough to fjo. 'J'he ground had to he ievelJed 
off, so as to make eorrjfortahJe the mule 'itkI horse 
lines. liopcH had to he pegged down and the 
ends of them })\in(:(\ in tfie ground, tied round 
sacks filled with clay, drains trenched out, and 
the ]'dr!j;<:r stones throwrj out of the way. 'ihen 
the mules had to })<: \'<A and watered, and I 
i'cartc] the latter was going to Ik* a difficult and 
dangerous husiness, for the only water discov- 
ered so far came under ^J'urkish fire. J^uckily 
for me, however, one of my men, Schouh, my 
farrier sergearjt, rliscovered a deep well care- 
fully hidden at the comer of a demolished build- 
ing, standing at the head of the little valley 
where we were camped. I feared that it might 
have been poisoned, so to solve my doubts 1 
werjt to the i^rrnost Marshal, and borrowed from 
him one of the captured Turkish prisoners. I 
felt sure that a 'J'urk coming from these jjarts 
would know the natural taste of the water, so I 
took him with me to the well and asked him to 
drink. lie was rather loth to do this at first, 
but at last, with a little persuasion, he took a 
sip in his mouth, rolled it for a moment on his 

[121] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

tongue, then, nodding approval, di'ank freely of 
the water. As he survived the ordeal, I thought 
it was all right to go ahead with the mules, and 
later on we used the well oui'selves, for it was 
excellent water. 

x\ll day long parties were coming and going 
between Y and W Beaches; forage, water tins, 
supplies, etc. — everything had to be brought to 
us on our pack mules, and the day was all too 
short to do the many things that landing in a 
new country in time of warfare makes neces- 
sarj\ Not nmch tune was wasted over the 
cooking of food; biscuits, jam, cheese, tinned 
beef, required no fires; only a little tea was 
boiled in our hastily-made camp kitchens. The 
only fuel to be had was obtained by breaking up 
some of our old packing-cases; the Turks had 
cleared off everything — not a man, woman, 
child or beast was left on the place — but this 
did not worry us, as we were always able to rustle 
for ourselves. 

Before dark that night we began to load up 
another big convoy of munitions and supplies 
for the trenches. 

This proved to be one of the most weird nights 
of many that we have spent tramping up and 
down the peninsula. 

[122] 



THE GULLY RAVINE 

Of course, we had to move off after dark, 
otherwise the Turks would have concentrated 
their artillery on us and we should all have been 
destroyed. We went from W to X Beach, 
along the ^Egean shore, falling into trenches 
and dug-outs on the way, for the night was very 
dark, while every now and again we were caught 
up in Turkish wire entanglements. Then from 
X Beach we slowly pioneered our way through 
the trackless scrub and undergrowth until we 
came to the cliff which overlooks Gully Beach, 
at the mouth of a huge ravine which here opened 
into the JEgean Sea, some miles northwest of W 
Beach. 

On the way we had to go through some of our 
own guns, which were in action on this side of 
the Peninsula, and I had to request the Battery 
Commander to cease fire while we were filing 
past, as I feared the roar and flash of the guns 
might stampede the mules. He let us through 
in silence, but we had scarcely got fifty yards 
from the muzzles when out belched the guns 
again, the roar of which at such close range, to 
my surprise, did not in the least upset the mules. 
I shall never forget our struggling down to the 
sea from the cliffs above the Gully. Of course 
there was no road then and we had to recon- 

[123] 



noitre ahead iii the dark every yard of tlie "svay. 
Often I had to turn back and call out to the men 
to halt as I found myself dangling on the edge 
of the cliff, holding on to the roots of the gorse, 
which fortmiately grew there in profusion. 
After many mishaps, mules and suppHes fall- 
ing about among the ravines which scored the 
face of the clitf, we eventually reached the 
beach. 

Then began our march up the bed of the 
ravine, and although the Gully was very wide 
and there was ample room to march either to 
right or left of the stream, yet we knew nothing 
of this, for the ground was new to us and every- 
thing was pitch dark, so the only sure way of 
getting up the ravine in safety was to walk in 
the river bed. I led the way. expecting all the 
time either to fall hito a waterhole or be shot by 
an ambuscade of Tiu'ks. Cliffs loomed up on 
either side of us to a height of a himdred or more 
feet, and there was nothing to be seen but the 
faint twinkle of the stars overhead. 

Xow and agam I called a halt to reconnoitre 
and listen for any suspicious movements ahead, 
as it was a most likely spot in which to be am- 
bushed by the enemy. So far as I knew the 
Turks were in possession of the bank to my left, 

[i-i] 



THE GULLY RAVINE 

and all that part of the country right up to 
Anzac, where the Australians had landed. For 
a time everything was (juiet as we splashed our 
way along, there hcing a lull just then in the 
fiuhtin^;: all of a sudden it hroke out again with 
feverish intensity. The Gully Ravine made a 
t^irn at one part of its course which took us right 
between the line of fire of the two opposing 
forces. Shells from om* own guns screamed and 
passed safely over the ravine, hut the shells from 
the Turkish batteries often burst exactly over- 
head, scattering shrapnel all round, at other 
times plunking into the cliff on our right and 
smothering us with clay and gravel. The rat- 
tle of musketry was like the continuous roll of 
kettledrums, and considering all our surround- 
ings, and the tierce tight that was going on, it 
was altogether a night to be remembered. 

At last we reached the troops holding the 
front line ; there were no supports or reserves, so 
far as I could see; every man had been put into 
the firing line, owing to the terrible losses that 
had been sustained. 

Here in the dark, with shot and shell flying all 
romid, we unpacked our mules and handed over 
the ammunition and food to the brigade. 

I was right glad to be able to turn back and 

[1-5] 



»> X X AX X XXXK ^-«XV-'^'% XksJJ X kj X^'« V.TJ.XXJXJXX \^JLU^ 

get my convoy safely away from the gloomy 
depths of this imcamiy rapine. 

We had again to climb the cliffs when we got 
back to the sea at the gully -mouth, and at the 
top again to negotiate om* gmis, which were still 
blazing away for all they were worth. However, 
by dint of much shouting when I had crawled 
close enough to be heard, the gmmers ceased fire 
just long enough to enable us to slip through. 

These two nights are fair examples of the work 
done in those early days by the Zion ^lule Corps, 
at that time the only transport corps on the Pen- 
insula at Helles. 



[126] 



CHAPTER XI 

HOW ZION MULES UPSET TURKISH PLANS 

It will be remembered that I left Claude Rolo 
on V Beach to take charge of our gear as it came 
off the Dundrennon, while Gye was left aboard 
that vessel to hurry everything ashore ; but it was 
not until the third day that we had disembarked 
all our belongings, the delay being entirely due 
to the shortage of steam tugs, on which I have 
already commented. 

During the time that our gear was stacked on 
V Beach, with, of course, a guard in charge of it, 
one of the sentries became the object of suspicion 
to the French, who were now in entire control 
of V Beach. After a few minutes, finding he 
could speak no understandable language (for he 
only spoke Russian or Hebrew, which, no doubt, 
sounded Turkish to the French), and seeing that 
he was armed with a Turkish rifle and bayonet 
and had Turkish cartridges in his belt, he was 
taken for a daring Turk who had invaded the 
beach to spy out the land. Without more ado, 
he was tried by drum-head court-martial and con- 

[127] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

denined to be shot out of hand. He was actu- 
ally up against the Avails o( Sedd-el-Balu" Castle, 
and tlie Uriiig party in position to carry out the 
execution, when the Sergeant hi charge of the 
Zionist Guard luckily spied what was happen- 
ing, and, as he spoke excellent French, he rapidly 
explained the situation. The man was released, 
but the shock was too much for hini, and when 
he was unboimd he was found to be paralysed, 
and it was two months before he was tit for duty 
again. After this, I allowed none of my men 
to leave camp mdess they could speak Enghsh 
or were accompanied by some one who could act 
as interpreter. 

Gye and Rolo worked hard to move the pile 
of equipment — water this, forage, etc., etc., to the 
little valley where the rest of the Corps were al- 
ready snugly encamped, overlooking W Beach. 
I was extremely glad to have these two olHcers 
with me agahi, because, dm-mg these three days 
aiid nights since the landing, while Me were 
separated, I had had a very strenuous tune. 

I remember when Gye saw me for the tirst 
time after coming ashore, he got quite a shock, 
and I believe he must have imagined that I had 
been indulguig in some frightful orgy, because 
he observed that the wliites of my eyes were as 

[i-s] 



MULES UPSET TURKISH PLANS 

red as burning coals; but it was only an orgy 
of work and want of sleep. 

I may say tliat when I did sleep I slept very 
soundly indeed, for a high explosive shell dropped 
within seven or eight feet of my head, exploded, 
blew a great hole in the ground, yet I never even 
heard it I 

This feat was outdone by a man who, on be- 
ing roused in the morning, found himself lame, 
and then discovered that he Iiad been sliot througli 
the foot some time in the night, while asleep! 

The work, owing to Gye and Uolo being with 
me, was now considerably lightened, as we each 
took a convoy out to different parts of the front, 
and so got the distribution of supplies through 
much more quickly. I was unable at that time 
to make use of my Jewish officers, with the ex- 
ception of Captain Trumpledor, for they were 
without experience and could not speak English. 
Later on they were able to take charge of con- 
voys and did the work very well. 

Gye, Rolo and I made a cheery little party 
and never found the time hang heavy on our 
hands, nor were we ever dull for a moment, even 
when we returned from convoy work at two 
o'clock in the morning. We would then have 
dinner together, and Gye was such a wonderful 

[129] 



story-teller, and Claude Rolo was such a good 
second, and he also possessed such an infectious 
laugh, that I have often literally fallen from the 
box on which I was sitting, con\'ulsed with mer- 
riment. I am sure the men of L Battery, R. H. 
A., who were camped close by, must have won- 
dered what all this unseemly racket was about at 
such miearthlv hours of the morning:. 

Gye's knowledge of colloquial Arabic was 
profound. It is related of him in Egypt that a 
Cairo street loafer on one occasion maliciously 
amioyed liim, whereupon Gye turned upon him 
and let loose such a flood of Arabic slang, mi- 
nutely vituperating the fellow himself and his 
ancestors for fom'teen generations back, that, 
despau'ing of ever reaching such heights of elo- 
quence, the loafer, out of sheer en\y, went 
straight away and hanged himself! 

In this first httle bivouac of om's I spread my 
gromid sheet and blanket in the corner of what 
had been a house. The gmis of the Fleet had 
evidenth' o'ot on to it and now nothino; was left 
standmg but some of the walls, which in places 
were about three or fom* feet high. 

A day or two after settling in here I happened 
to jimip down from one of these walls and the 
ground gave way somewhat under me. We 

[ISO] 



MULES UPSET TURKISH PLANS 

made an excavation into it and discovered, hidden 
away in an underground chamber, an old green 
silk flag, so ancient that a touch rent it, an an- 
tiquated battle-axe dating, I should say, from 
the time of the Crusaders, and also some antique 
brass candlesticks — a curious and rare find in 
such a place. 

It must not be supposed that the Turks left 
us in peace during the day. They constantly 
dropped shells into our little valley, tearing holes 
in the gromid all round us, but by great good 
fortune while we were in this place we suffered 
no casualty of any kind, either man or mule. 

On May 1st, after nightfall, I sent Claude 
Rolo out in the direction of the Gully Ravine, 
with ammunition and supplies for one of the 
Brigades of the 29th Division. He got to his 
destination safely, but while he was unloading the 
convoy, at about ten o'clock, whether by chance 
or design I know not, a tremendous hail of 
shrapnel was poured upon them from the Turk- 
ish guns a couple of miles away. Some forty of 
the mules had already been relieved of their loads 
and many of these broke away and galloped off 
into the darkness. 

This turned out to be a providential diversion, 
for they helped to save the British Army that 

[131] 



night, in much the same waj^ as the cackhng geese 
once saved Rome, for, all unknown to us, masses 
of Turks were at that very moment creeping up 
in the dark just before the rise of the moon. 
They were in tlu*ee lines, the first line being with- 
out ammunition, as it was their particular busi- 
ness, when they got near enough to our trenches, 
to rush them with the bayonet. The Turkish 
General Staff, however, had not calculated on 
Zion mules! The terrified mmials, scared and 
wounded by the shrapnel, careered over our 
trenches and clattered down with clanking chains 
on the stealthy foe. The Turks undoubtedly 
took them for charging cavalry, for they poured 
a volley into them and thus gave away their posi- 
tion. 

Our men instantly lined the trenches and 
opened such an intense fii'e that the Turks were 
utterly routed, and those of them that were left 
alive fled back to the cover of their own trenches. 
The battle was taken up all along the line, and, 
if volume of musketry comits for anything, it was 
the hottest night fight we had during all the time 
we were on the Peninsula. 

Claude Rolo had a most arduous and perilous 
time collecting his men and mules in the midst of 
all this turmoil, but he eventually got them to- 

[132] 



gether and took them down a side track to the 
Gully, into which they all scrambled helter-skel- 
ter, for safety. 

One of the men, Private Groushkousky, dis- 
tinguished himself greatly in this fight, for when 
the hail of shrapnel descended on the convoy and 
stampeded many of the mules, this plucky boy 
— for he was a mere youth — although shot 
through both arms, held on to his plunging ani- 
mals and safely delivered his loads of ammuni- 
tion to the men in the firing line. I promoted 
Private Groushkousky to the rank of Corporal, 
for his pluck and devotion to duty, and, in ad- 
dition, recommended him for the D. C. M., which 
I am glad to say he obtained. 

While Rolo and his men were having such a 
strenuous time on the left of the line, I took a 
convoy to the Brigade holding the centre. At 
about two o'clock in the morning, soon after we 
had returned, we were all having a much-needed 
sleep, for we were worn out with constant com- 
ing and going day and night. I was roused from 
a deep slumber into which I had fallen by a mes- 
senger to say ammunition was urgently required 
by the Anson Battalion of the Royal Naval Divi- 
sion and other units on the right flank of our line. 
I remember what a difficult task it was to rouse 

[133] 



the men, who lay about on the ground, like 
roUed-up balls, in front of their mules. I found 
a very effective plan was to shout loudly in tlieir 
ear: '"Turks!" That, coupled with the roar of 
the gims and the crackling of the rifles, quickly 
brought them back to realities, and ahnost in the 
twinkling of an eye the Zion men were loaihng up 
cartridges with feverish speed at the Ordnance 
Depot, which was situated not many yards below 
our lines. I always kept our mules saddled 
throughout the day and night, in relays, for I 
knew that in those strenuous times I would be 
likely to get a call at any moment to supply the 
liring line with anmiunition. 

Xo matter at what hour of the day or night 
we went to the ammmiition stack, ^lajor Howell 
Jones, the Chief Ordnance Officer of the 29th 
Division, was always on the spot to issue it; and 
not only was he there, but if there was any 
"push" on, he turned to and helped to load up 
the mules with his own hands. He was one of 
the hardest-worked men on the Peninsula, and 
I smcerely hope that the 29th Division realises 
all it owes to his energy and foresight. 

In those early days after the first landing, when 
we were pressing the Turks so steadily before 
us, and we all expected that one tinal push would 

[134] 



drive them over Achi IJaba, the Zionists peti- 
tioned (General Hunter- Weston to })e permitted 
to take part in the assault. After some consider- 
ation, the (General rel'used to let us go, saying 
that we were performing invaluable services in 
keeping the men in the trenches supphed with 
amnmnition and food. Although we were de- 
nied officially the privilege of actually taking part 
in the attack, yet unofficially some of the Coi-ps, 
at least, had the gratification of joining battle 
with the Turks. 

It must be remembered that our troops had 
suffered terrible losses in those early battles, and 
the Inniskilling Fusiliers had fared no better than 
the rest, and they had very few men indeed with 
which to man their trenches in the event of an 
attack. Now it so happened that the Turks 
made a determined onslaught upon them on one 
occasion, when a party of the Zion Mule Corps 
was close by, unloading a convoy; and these 
Zionists, having the lust of battle strong in them, 
and seeing how weak the Inniskillings were, left 
their mules to take care of themselves and, under 
the leadership of Corporal Hildersheim, leaped 
into the trenches and materially assisted in re- 
pelling the Turks. 

[135] 



CHAPTER XII 

LIFE IN OUR NEW CAMP 

More and more troops kept on disembarking and 
within fourteen days we found ourselves being 
crowded out of our little vallej^ that ran up from 
the sea, and it became a pressing necessity to look 
out for fresh quarters further inland. Nor were 
we sorry to move, for a road had been made close 
to our lines, which, owing to the great traffic 
upon it, was now several inches deep, in fine 
white dust, which blew over us in choking clouds. 
At this time, the whole of the Peninsula, from 
Cape Helles to Achi Baba, was one expanse of 
green pastures and cultivation, and the country 
looked exceeding^ pretty. Quantities of beau- 
tiful flowers grew everywhere, so much so that 
some fields were a regular blaze of colour, the 
western slopes of Achi Baba itself being beau- 
tified by gorgeous stretches of blood-red poppies. 
Groves of trees of various kinds were dotted 
about, while the olive and the almond flourished 
everywhere. Here and there were to be seen 
round, masonry-topped wells, just like those pic- 

[136] 



tured in illustrated Bibles, showing Rebecca 
drawing water for Abraham's servant — but, alas, 
here there was no Rebecca ! 

Before we left it, this smiling land became the 
most desolate, God-forsaken place that it is pos- 
sible to imagine — nothing but row upon row of 
unsightly trenches, and not a single blade of grass 
anywhere to meet the eye. 

For our new encampment I chose a level green 
field, some two miles inland, and into this we 
moved on May 11th. 

A beautiful olive tree grew and threw a grate- 
ful shade by the edge of our encampment, and 
here, practically under its roots, we excavated a 
shallow dug-out and erected over it a shelter of 
canvas. Gye, Rolo and I settled ourselves in 
as comfortably as possible, and although we 
thought it merely a temporary halting-place on 
the way to Constantinople, we never moved 
camp again, and, indeed, for over seven months 
it was our home. 

I had occasion to ride back to W Beach within 
a couple of hours after quitting our first encamp- 
ment, and I heartily congratulated myself that 
we had cleared out of it just in the nick of time, 
for the Turks had concentrated their guns on the 
place immediately after we had left. I counted 

[137] 



no less than thirty holes through a piece of canvas 
that was stretched over the place where we had 
slept the night before. Had we still been there 
we must all inevitably have been blown to smith- 
ereens I 

At our new encampment we found, burrowed 
into the ground about us, the wagon lines of B, 
L and Y Batteries, R. H. A., together with the 
ammunition column — in fact, our lines joined up 
with L Battery, which, it will be remembered, 
earned such fame, and won so many V C's dur- 
ing the retreat from Mons. Lieutenant David- 
son of this Battery was in charge of the wagon 
lines, and, as it was Gallipoli, and he was all 
alone, the haughty horse gunner did not disdain 
to join the lowly Muleteers' Mess! We were 
very glad to have him, as he was good, cheery, 
sensible company, and he also made a fourth at 
Bridge, which was our relaxation when nothing 
else had to be done. It is odd, when one thinks 
of it now, that we were far more interested at 
times, when the game got exciting, as to who 
should make the odd trick than in the Turkish 
shells, which flew screaming by a few feet over 
our heads, especially when one remembers that 
the deflection of the guns by a hair's-breadth by 
those tiresome fellows who were peppering us 

[138] 



from Aclii Baba and the plains of Ilium would 
have meant that, in our peaceful little dug-out, 
spades would have been trumps! 

During the course of our stay here we gradu- 
ally excavated and enlarged our dwelling and 
burrowed down into the ground, making a cellar 
into which we could retire in case the shelling be- 
came too hot, but, as a matter of fact, though the 
bombardment at times was hot enough to satisfy 
the most desperate fire-eater, we used our bomb 
proof entirely as a pantry, for which we found it 
most useful. 

No sooner had we settled down to life in our 
new bivouac than the Turks began to annoy us by 
dropping shells into it and disturbing our peace 
of mind and body. On the morning following 
our arrival, while we were having breakfast under 
the spreading branches of our olive tree, a shrap- 
nel burst, sending its bullets unpleasantly near. 
I remarked jocularly to the others that if the 
next shell came any closer we should have to 
move. Scarcely had I spoken when one went 
bang just over us, and a bullet whizzed between 
our heads and smashed through the arm of my 
Orderly Room Sergeant, Abulafia, who at that 
moment was standing by my side taking some 
orders. It is a marvel how it missed hitting a 

[139] 



member of our little mess, for we were all sitting 
very close together round an upturned box which 
we were using as a breakfast table. 

The same shell wounded two other men, be- 
sides killing and wounding half a dozen mules. 
AVe decided that the place was too hot for us, so, 
after helping our jNIedical Officer to di-ess the 
wounded, we finished our breakfast on the other 
side of a bank which ran along bj" our olive 
tree. 

I must mention here that Sergeant Abulafia 
refused to have his wound dressed until the 
others who were more seriously mjured had iii'st 
received attention. 

Dr. Levontin was very good in attending to 
wounded men under fire, and he gave first aid to 
these men and many others, often at great per- 
sonal risk; but at last the continual battering of 
high explosive shells so close to his dug-out was 
too much for him, and his nerves went, as did the 
nerves of many others, and there was nothing for 
it but to send hun back to Egypt. From the 
time of his departure our sick and wounded were 
ministered to by Captain Blandy, R. A. M. C, 
who was the medical officer in charge of the bat- 
teries camped round us, and the men, finding 
Captaui Blandy most sympathetic and painstak- 

[140] 



ing, did not fail to avail themselves to the full 
of his able services. 

The troublesome Turks did not allow us to 
keep our animals in the pleasant field where we 
had, after much trouble, laid down our ropes and 
pegs and made our lines. 

From Achi Baba and the slopes above Krithia 
they could see us perfectly well, and they rained 
such a tornado of shells round about us, plough- 
ing up the ground in all directions, that I ordered 
a hasty evacuation of the field and chose another 
site close by, somewhat better concealed from 
view by a plantation of olive trees. It was ex- 
tremely difficult to hide from the Turks as Achi 
Baba dominated the whole Peninsula. Even in 
our new position we were not allowed to remain 
undisturbed, for almost daily the Turks peppered 
us with shrapnel and high explosives, both from 
Achi Baba and the Asiatic coast. 

I set the men to work to dig themselves and the 
mules well into the bowels of the earth, and in a 
very short time they had done this so effectually 
that a stranger visiting the place would be as- 
tonished if he were told that some hundreds of 
men and mules were concealed right under his 
very nose. 

Soon after we had evacuated the field in which 

[141] 



the Turks had shelled us so vigorously it was 
taken possession of by the Collingwood Battalion 
of the Royal Naval Division. The}^ arrived in 
the dusk of the evening, and as they were ap- 
parently unaware of their dangerous position, I 
felt it to be my duty to go and warn the Com- 
manding Officer, Captain Spearman, R. N., how 
exposed the place was, and how they would prob- 
ably be plastered by high explosives as soon as the 
Turks discovered them on the following morning. 
Captain Spearman was very glad to be given this 
friendly warning and, in consequence, he made 
his Battalion dig itself well in, and for several 
hours into the night I could hear pick and spade 
digging and delving. It was well they did so, 
for on the following morning a brisk bombard- 
ment opened on them, but, thanks to the precau- 
tions which they had taken, thej^, on that day at 
all events, suffered no casualties. 

It was very funny to see the men sitting in rows 
along the banks of earth thrown up out of their 
"dug-outs" and watch them dive, like rabbits into 
their burrows, at the sound of an approaching 
shell ; then, after the explosion, every one popped 
up again to see what damage had been done. 

During the time they were camped there a shell 
would now and again plump right into a dug-out 

[142] 



and then, of course, the unfortunate occupants 
would be blown about in little pieces all over the 
place. A hand was once blown down to my horse 
lines, some hundred and fifty yards away from 
where the shell had burst, and shattered a man 
to atoms. 

A German Taube for a time flew over our lines 
every morning long before sunrise, of course 
catching all our airmen napping. These visits 
were generally for observation purposes, but 
sometimes the Taubes would liven us up by drop- 
ping a few bombs. They made several shots at 
the French guns, but always missed. I saw a 
bomb land among a dozen French horses one 
day, and all of the unfortunate animals were ter- 
ribly wounded. I never saw such shambles, for 
the horses were in a dug-out close together for 
safety. The Zion lines had several close escapes, 
as did the Royal Naval Division Hospital which 
was close to us, and where Staff-Surgeon Flem- 
ing cheerfully and skilfully attended to our sick 
and wounded at all times of the day and night. 

The Taube is a much more vicious looking 
machine than ours. It has a certain air of ar- 
rogance about it, entirely lacking in our type of 
aeroplane. It is not in the least like a dove, as 
the German name signifies, but appears to me 

[143] 



very like a hawk, always ready to pounce on its 
prey. 

Day by day one kept missing friendly faces. 
I remember sueh a niee boy, belonoing to one of 
the Naval Battalions, who used to pass my camp 
regularly with his platoon on his way to the 
beach to bathe. I never knew^ the boy's name, 
but he interested me as he was a bright, cheery, 
handsome youngster, who seemed to be on the 
best of terms with his men. One day there was 
a vigorous bombardment of his lines, and when 
next the platoon went by the young oilicer was 
missing. He had been blown to pieces by a 
shell. 

The Royal Naval Division were a mixed crowd, 
and their ways in Gallipoli were somewhat pecul- 
iar. Their habits and customs were decidedly 
"herumphroditish." They performed mihtary 
duties as ordinary Infantry; then they jumped 
back and were sailors again. They kept time by 
the chiming of ships' bells; when they were 
wanted out of their dug-outs the boatswain would 
pipe "All hands on deck"; when a company was 
mustered on parade, the Commander (when the 
Commodore came along!) reported "All present 
on the main deck, sir" — the main deck being 
along a hne of dug-outs ; and if one hermnphro- 

[114] 



dite wished to visit another herumphrodite in a 
different Battalion, he had to apply for "shore 
leave"! 

The Collingwood Battalion met with a very sad 
end soon after their arrival in my neighbourhood. 
They were sent up to take part i'or the first time 
in an attack on the Turkish trenches, and they 
were placed on our extreme right, linking up 
with the French. When the order came to 
charge, they went forward most gallantly, captur- 
ing, with little loss, two of the Turkish lines of 
trenches, Captain Spearman, well to the fore, 
leading his men. lie got shot in the foot, hut, 
ignoring it, dashed along, waving his hat in the 
air as he cheered his men to the assault. Un- 
fortunately, owing to the conspicuous part he 
and his officers played in the attack (and it was 
necessary that they should do so, owing to the 
rawness of the men), he and practically all the 
other officers of the battalion were killed. Then 
some one, possibly a German, for there were sev- 
eral of them in the Turkish trenches round about, 
shouted out the fatal word "Retire." This was 
carried along the line and the men turned about 
and made back, helter-skelter, for their own 
trenches, but in trying to gain them they were 
practically annihilated by machine-gun and rifle 

[145] 



lire. I was particularly sorry for Captain 
Spearman, who had come to our dug-out on many 
occasions, and had drunk an early cup of coffee 
with us only a few hours before he was killed. 

In this disastrous retreat the CoUingwood Bat- 
talion was practically wiped out. The survivors 
were transferred to another unit of the Royal 
Naval Division and the very name of this Bat- 
talion went out of existence. 



[146] 



CHAPTER XIII 

A MAY BATTLE 

During a big battle which took place early in 
May, I sent Gye forward with a large convoy of 
ammunition, and on riding out later on to see 
Iiow things were going I passed over some of 
the ground occupied })y tlie French, who were 
to the right of the British, and extended from 
thence across the Peninsula to the Dardanelles. 
A couple of miles to the rear of the fighting line 
extended the batteries of the famous .75s, cun- 
ningly concealed among trees, branches specially 
planted in the ground, reeds, etc. I watched 
tlie gunners serve their guns, and my admira- 
tion was aroused at witnessing the ease and 
celerity with which they were loaded, their me- 
chanical arrangement for setting the fuse, and, 
above all, the beautifully smooth recoil of the bar- 
rel. This was so nicely adjusted that I might 
have placed my finger on the ground behind the 
wheel of the gun and have received no damage. 
The French Army can give us points on many 
[147] 



things, but above all stands their .75 gun. They 
are wonderfully accurate, marvellously quick, 
and seem able to pour out from their muzzles 
a continuous stream of projectiles. The French 
certainly did not starve their gunners in ammuni- 
tion, and only for those .75s our position in Gal- 
lipoli would often have been somewhat precari- 
ous. 

After I had watched the guns in action for a 
while I passed on, and going down the sandy 
road which led from Sedd-el-Bahr village to 
Krithia I came upon the first evidences of the 
fight that was now raging. A handsome young 
French artilleryman lay dead by the side of the 
road; some friend had closed his eyes, and he 
looked as if he merely slept, but it was the long 
sleep of death. A little further on lay some 
Zouaves, and yet a little further some Sene- 
galese, all lying just as they fell, with their packs 
on their backs and theu- rifles close by, facing the 
foe — brave French soldiers all. 

Tm-ning a corner I found myself riding into 
General d'Amade and his staff, busily directing 
the battle. Almost at the General's horse's feet 
laj'- a Turk whose face was half blown away. 
The poor fellow had wrapped the end of his pug- 
aree round his ghastly wound. Within a yard 

[148] 



or two lay another Turk, his shoulder smashed to 
pulp by a shell. Both men bore up with the 
greatest fortitude and never uttered a groan. A 
first-aid di-essing station was close by, where 
scores of wounded, French and Turks, were be- 
ing doctored and bandaged. These sights of the 
uglier and sadder side of war are not pleasing, 
and any one who has seen the horrors of it can 
never wish to view such scenes again. I would 
put all Foreign Ministers, Diplomats and News- 
paper Proprietors in the forefront of every bat- 
tle for which they were in any way responsible. 
However, duty has to be done, even in the midst 
of horrors, so saluting the General, I pushed 
further along to the front, where I could see Gye 
with the mules in the distance. 

By the time I had cantered up to him all the 
ammunition had been unloaded, and at the spot 
where I halted I found myself looking over a 
bank into the midst of a Battalion of cheery ht- 
tle Gurkhas (the 6th) and almost within hand- 
shake of their Commander, Colonel C. Bruce, 
who was an old acquaintance of mine. I had no 
idea he was in Gallipoli, and it was curious to 
come upon him, after some years, in the thick of 
a battle. 

I stayed for a time chatting with him while the 

[149] 



bullets aiid shells whizzed round — in fact, until 
an order came for his Battalion to go forward 
into the fight. 

I myself went and took up a position on a hill 
close by, where I could see, as if from the gallery 
of a theatre, the whole tight staged before me: 
where I could note the move of practically every 
man and gmi. 

As I looked down from my post of observation, 
a saucer-like green valley full of olive trees, vine- 
yards and young corn spread out before me for 
some five miles, right aw^ay up to Achi Baba. the 
dominating hill, some six hundred or seven lum- 
dred feet high. The French, as 1 have already 
said, were away on the right, and I watched 
their infantry mass in hollows and ravines, then 
advance in wavy Imes under the pounding shel- 
ter of their guns. The latter were served mag- 
nificently, and the infantry as they advanced 
fomid the gromid to then* mmiediate front swept 
yard by yard by the gains tired by their comrades 
a couple of miles to their rear. 

It was a stirring sight to watch the ofiicers 
dash out and give the men a lead when there was 
any hesitation or waver of the line. In places 
I could see the Turks rmi like hares, but on the 
extreme left the French who were in touch with 

[150] 



our right could be seen retiring precipitately over 
the hill, budly slated by the Turks. 

I was fascinated by the sight and wondered 
how that broken line could be again reformed. 
It was done, however, in the shelter of a bluff, 
and once more they charged over the hill and 
were then lost to my view. 

The 29th Division extended from the French 
left, near the right centre of the saucer, across 
to the iEgean Sea. The front was towards Achi 
Baba, and our men made headway towards it in 
the face of fierce opposition. Our guns were 
barking away at the Turks in their trenches, and 
the great guns of the Fleet were hurling their 
high explosives, which descended on the doomed 
Turks with terrific effect. One could see great 
spurts of flame, smoke, earth, timbers, rocks, 
Turks, in fact, everything in the neighbourhood, 
going up as though shot out of the crater of a 
volcano. 

To me it seemed as though nothing could pos- 
sibly live under such a reign of death, which con- 
tinued with ever-increasing intensity for an hour. 
Nothing could be seen of Achi Baba, or any 
other part of the Turkish position, owing to the 
smoke and dust which the bombardment had 
raised, and unfortunately the wind was blowing 

[151] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

towards us, which brought everything into the 
eyes of our men as they leaped out of the trenches 
to the attack. 

The moment the guns ceased one could dis- 
cern, through the haze, the gleam of bayonets as 
the Allies swept forward along the whole front 
like a bristlmg wall of steel, right into the lead- 
ing Turkish trenches. 

Wherever the bombardment had done its work 
and smashed down the wu-e entanglements, our 
men found it easy to advance. Such Turks as 
remained in the trenches were dazed and de- 
morahsed by the shell fire, and were only too 
willing to surrender. But in some parts, es- 
pecially on the left of the line, the guns had failed 
to cut down the barbed wire, and here our men 
were crumpled up by the deadly fire of rifle and 
machine-gun which was concentrated on them at 
this point. 

It was a soul-stirring sight to watch, on this 
great stage, the alternate advance and retreat of 
our men, and the scuttle of the Turks along their 
communication trenches; the charge of the 
Zouaves, the hurried retirement of the Senegalese 
when they were met with a terrific fire from the 
Turks; the reforming of the line behind the 
friendly crest; the renewed pounding of the 

[152] 



A MAY BATTLE 

Turkish line by French and British guns; the 
charge once more of the AUied infantry into and 
through the Turkish curtain of fire until they 
were swallowed up in the smoke. 

The heart palpitated with emotion, and one*s 
imagination was gripped by the sight of these 
gallant fellows flinging themselves recklessly at 
the Turks. 

At length human nature could do no more, and 
both British and French had to call a halt. 

The result of the battle was that we gained 
some few hundred yards practically along the 
whole front except on the extreme left, but it 
was at a considerable cost in killed and wounded. 



[153] 



CHAPTER XIV 

GENERAL d'aMADE AND THE CORPS EXPEDITION- 
NAIRE d'oRIENT 

One end of our camp was in touch with the 
French lines and, of course, I saw a great deal 
of the French soldiers and a little of their gallant 
Commander, General d'Amade. I know, there- 
fore, with what feelings of regret his men heard 
that he was about to return to France. He had 
endeared himself by his unfailing courtesy and 
goodwill, and had impressed with his fine, sol- 
dierly qualities all those with whom he had in any 
wa}^ come into contact. 

During the tenure of his command, the French 
troops had, at the point of the bayonet, wrested 
seemingl}^ impregnable positions from the brave 
foe. Their losses had been cruel, terrible, but 
their deeds are imperishable. 

The military records of France make glorious 
reading, but even to these dazzling pages Gen- 
eral d'Amade and his gallant troops have added 
fresh lustre. 

A sad blow had fallen upon the General while 

[154] 



EXPfiDITIONNAIRE D'ORIENT 

he was in Alexandria reorganising his Corps 
Exp edit ionnaire d'Orient, prior to its departure 
for Galhpoh. In the midst of his work a tele- 
gram was handed to him announcing that his son 
had fallen gloriously in France. The General, 
having read the heart-breaking message, paused 
for a moment and then remarked: "Well, our 
work for France must go on." 

It was my good fortune to see the order of the 
day of the Journal Officiel du 11 Fevrier, 1915, 
which recounted the death and gallant deeds of 
General d'Amade's boy. He was only eighteen 
and had just joined his regiment, the 131st In- 
fantry, when he went on a perilous night mission 
to obtain information which could only be got 
by creeping up into the German trenches. With 
just two men he accomplished this dangerous 
duty successfully, but at that very moment he 
was discovered and a volley from the enemy laid 
him low. Although grievously wounded, his 
first thought was for France, so, forbidding his 
comrades to carry him off, he told them to fly 
with all speed to the French lines with the valu- 
able information which he had obtained. Young 
Gerard d'Amade died where he had fallen, a 
noble example of that spirit of self-sacrifice which 
characterises all ranks of the French Army. 

[155] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

A framed copy of this order of the day has 
now a place of honour in the nursery of a little 
boy I know of who, every night before he goes 
to bed, stands in front of it at the salute and 
says: *'I do this in memory of a brave French 
officer who gave his life for his country. May 
I so live that, if necessary, I may be ready to die 
for England as nobly as Gerard d'Amade died 
for France." 

The British public is little aware of what it 
owes to General d'Amade. During the terrible 
retreat of our Expeditionary Force from JNIons, 
when we were outnumbered by five to one, and 
when the Germans were closing round our small 
army in overwhelming numbers, General Sir 
John French sent out urgent appeals for as- 
sistance in this hour of dire peril to the Generals 
conmianding the French armies on his right and 
left. For some reason or other none of these 
came to his aid, and for a time it looked as if our 
gallant little army would be engulfed and anni- 
hilated. 

Fortunately, there was one French General to 
whom the appeal was not made in vain. This 
was General d'Amade, who, at that time, was 
guarding the line in the northwest of France 
from Dunkerque to Valenciennes. To hold this 

[156] 



exp:6ditioxnaire dorient 

very important eighty miles of front all the 
troops he had were four divisions of somewhat 
ill-equipped Territorials, with very few guns. 
It must be remembered that the French Terri- 
torial is past his prime and, as a rule, is the father 
of a family, and considers his fighting days over. 
It can well be imagined, therefore, what an 
anxious time General d'Amade had during those 
fateful days from the 19th to the 28th August, 
1914, when at any moment the German avalanche 
might burst upon him. On the 24th August his 
force was strengthened by two Reserve Divisions 
(the 61st and 62nd), which only arrived in the 
nick of time, for with these he was able to 
do something in answer to General French's de- 
spairing appeal. General d'Amade manoeuvred 
these two Reserve Divisions into a position which 
seriously threatened von Kluck's flank. That 
^'hacking" General, not knowing the strength of 
General d'Amade's menacing force, became anx- 
ious for his right flank and communications, so 
turned aside from his pursuit of the British and 
proceeded to crush the French. These two di- 
visions put up such an heroic fight and offered 
such a stubborn resistance to the German horde 
that it took the pressure off our sorely stricken 
men, enabling them to extricate themselves and 

[157] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

retire, broken, exhausted, tired, crushed, it is 
true, but still to retire to safety, where they were 
able to reorganise and take ample vengeance on 
the Germans a few days later. 

General d'Amade lost practically his entire 
force, but he had gained something very pre- 
cious; he had saved our army from destruction, 
and what is more, he had saved the honour of 
France — nay, even France itself, for if the 
French generals had stood idly by and allowed 
our Expeditionary Force to be wiped out of ex- 
istence, I think it is more than likely that France 
might have prayed in vain for any further as- 
sistance, in troops at all events, from England. 

All honour, therefore, to the General who, 
without hesitation, with just two Reserve Divi- 
sions, took the shock of the German legions and 
sacrificed himself and his troops rather than see 
the honom* of France go down in the dust. Poli- 
ticians may reconmiend the bestowal of honour^s 
and decorations on their favourite Generals, but 
General d'Amade deserves more than this, he de- 
serves a tribute from the British people. He 
made a magnificent sacrifice in our cause, and if 
ever in the history of the world a general de- 
served a sword of honour from a nation. Gen- 
eral d'Amade deserves one from England. 

[158] 



CHAPTER XV 

VARIOUS BOMBARDMENTS 

Every morning regularly the Turks commenced 
shelling us punctually at eight o'clock, presu- 
mably after they had had breakfast, and again at 
tea time. They generally continued for a couple 
of hours, and these hours were always lively ones 
for us, and it was a daily occurrence to lose men, 
horses and mules. 

On the 16th May, eleven Frenchmen, who hap- 
pened to be close to our lines, were killed in- 
stantly by one shell, on the 17th one of my horses 
was wounded, and on the 19th the second was hit 
in the ribs by shrapnel. 

The Turks often switched off from us and 
bombarded a section of the road used by wagons, 
gun-teams and motor cyclists. The latter were, 
to me, the chief wonder of Gallipoli. I ride a 
motor cycle myself, and have had a few smashes, 
so can fully realise its dangers. 

I was introduced to this convenient form of 
locomotion by Dr. liolleston after a breakdown 
in health. It is the most wonderful tonic I have 

[159] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GxVLLIPOLI 

yet come across, because the moment one gets on 
to the bicycle one's attention is so centred on 
keeping it going, picking out the smoothest bits 
of road, avoidhig colhsions, etc., that I veritably 
believe the treachery of one's closest friend would, 
for the moment, at least, fade from the memory. 
I am perfectly certain that the Gallipoli motor 
cyclists never gave a thought to absent friends; 
they were much too busy avoiding pitfalls and 
shells. They flew over the most uneven ground, 
took small trenches as it were in their stride, and 
were generally the most dare-devil set of boys I 
have ever seen. ^lany a time we stood and 
watched through our glasses this dangerous strip 
of road which the Turks had got the range of to 
a yard. xVs the wagons, gun-teams iuid cyclists 
approached it, they would get up the pace, and 
fly through it at top speed. The narrow squeaks 
that we constantly witnessed on this bit of road 
were enough to make one's hair stand on end! 
Yet I am glad to say I only once saw a man 
struck down. It looked so sad — the moment be- 
fore so full of the joy of hfe, and then, just a 
little, huddled heap, lying still and quiet on the 
dusty roadw^ay. 

On ]May 20th, the Turks bombarded us for sev- 
eral hours; five of my men were womided, two 

[160] 



VARIOUS BOMBARDMENTS 

seriously, one of the poor fellows having his leg 
smashed to atoms. The same day I had five 
mules and one horse killed and ten mules 
wounded. The Horse Artillery, camped round 
ahout us, also suffered rather severely, for the 
Turks every now and again switched their bat- 
teries on to their lines and caused them heavy 
losses. It was a busy time for Lieutenant Fisher, 
the Veterinary Surgeon of the Horse Batteries, 
who kindly came to our aid whenever the Zion 
mules got "strafed." 

When this bombardment broke upon us, every- 
body made a rush to get his horse, mule or him- 
self out of danger, and many were the curses 
heaped on the Turkish gunners, who were uni- 
versally consigned to the warmest place of which 
we have ever heard. It makes me laugh even 
now when I think of a little comedy that took 
place between Rolo and his groom. The latter, 
whose name was Dabani, was a most comical look- 
ing little fellow, with bandy legs, a swarthy face, 
and little black beard sprouting in patches here 
and there. He was an Israelite from Arabia, 
and although an excellent fellow in many ways, 
he was more renowned for his piety than for his 
courage. You could always tell the intensity of 
a bombardment by the fervour of Dabani's 

[161] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

prayers. On this occasion, when the shells be- 
gan to burst and spatter the shrapnel all round 
us, Rolo shouted to Dabani, whom he saw scut- 
tling off for safety, to come back and look after 
his horse. ""Wliat, look after your horse now?" 
cried Dabani. "This is a time when I must look 
after myself," and taking not the slightest notice 
of Rolo's angry maledictions, he, with rabbit-like 
agihty, dived for safety into his dug-out! 

This bombardment badly shook some of my 
men, and among them Schoub, my farrier, who, 
the moment he felt it safe to emerge from the 
nethermost depths of his dug-out, came in a state 
of abject terror to Gye, beggmg piteously to be 
sent back to the bosom of his family in Alexan- 
dria, because, he remarked, "I am no use here 
now. The shells have made me stone deaf, I 
cannot hear a word." "What," said Gye, in a 
low voice, "not a single word?" "Not a single 
word," rephed Schoub! 

It was many months before he returned in 
safety to Alexandria, and by that time bombard- 
ments had become so common that they had 
ceased to terrify. 

On the 2nd June, I was returning with Claude 
Rolo from an expedition which we had made to 
the Gurklia trenches on the extreme left of the 

[162] 



VARIOUS BOMBARDMENTS 

line. Before we had got very far on our way 
heavy howitzers hegan to hombard the Turks, 
and as we were just then passing an artillery ob- 
servation post, hidden away in a cross trench, we 
turned aside and went into it. From here we 
could see our high explosive shells bursting with 
terrific effect on the Turkish trench, which was 
only about three hundred yards awa3^ The Ar- 
tillery Observation Officer telephoned back to 
the guns the result of each shot, and under his 
guidance the shells soon battered down the earth- 
works, pulverising everything where they fell. 
Soon, however, some sharp-eyed Turkish gunner 
spotted our observation post and began to plug 
at us pretty rapidly. Shells hopped off the 
parapet, shrapnel struck the steel shield, fuses 
and fragments of all kinds thudded into the bank 
behind our backs, and we seemed for the moment 
to be living in a little tornado of lead and iron. 
When this had continued for a few minutes, I 
remarked to the gunner man: "What on earth 
are the Turks trying to hit?" "Hit us, of 
course," he somewhat shortly replied. 

Now, so long as we remained here in the deep 
trench we were comparatively safe, but as I 
wanted to get back to camp, I thought I would 
pull the gunner's leg before leaving him; he had 

[163] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

no idea who we were, for we were in our shirt 
sleeves as usual, so I pretended to be thorouglily 
scared, and said: "Good heavens, this is no 
place for me!" on which he smiled the smile of a 
brave man who feels pity for a poltroon. There 
were some twenty yards or so of open gromid to 
be covered the moment we left the shelter of the 
observation post, and, of com'se, this was a really 
dangerous strip, because it was exposed to the 
fire of the Turks, and had therefore to be covered 
at top speed. The only way of accomplishing 
this in safety was to do it in between the shells, 
and as there was only a couple of seconds be- 
tween each, the plmige out had to be made the 
instant one burst, so as to be under cover before 
the next arrived. Warning Rolo to follow me 
after the next explosion, out we darted. We 
had ahnost reached safety when I heard coming 
after us the scream of an approaching shell. I 
shouted out to Rolo, "Jump for yoiu* life!" and 
at the same time tlirew myself down, and the last 
thing I saw, amid the dust kicked up by the 
shower of shrapnel bullets, was Rolo plmigmg 
head foremost into a ditch, as if he were taking a 
'dive! 

We were neither of us hurt, but a stone thrown 
up by the shell struck me on the hand and drew 

[164] 



VARIOUS BOMBARDMENTS 

a little blood. We both congratulated ourselves 
on our lucky escape and got back to camp with 
whole skins, none the worse for our close shave. 



[165] 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE COMING OF THE GERMAN SUBMARINES 

In our nightly journeys back from the trenches 
we were always guided through the darkness to 
our camp by the brilliant glare of the lights from 
the warships, hospital ships and transports, which 
lay thickly clustered round Cape Helles. It was 
a most beautiful sight, like a veritable floating 
Venice, but it was not practical and it was not 
war. It showed an arrogance and utter con- 
tempt of the enemy who was, at that very mo- 
ment, stealthily stalking them under the seas with 
the deadly submarine. 

At all events, the submarines came, with the 
result that the battleships Goliath and Trium'ph 
were sunk with appalling swiftness and great loss 
of life. 

Then, and then only, did the Fleet awaken to 
its danger; the battleships and cruisers vanished 
into the unknown, while the transports disap- 
peared in a night, and we felt, as it were, ma- 
rooned on this inhospitable Peninsula, from 
which the Turks had removed every living thing, 

[166] 



THE GERMAN SUBJNIARINES 

save only a few dogs, which were found to be so 
dangerous that they had to be shot at sight. 

It was, therefore, with feehngs of great pleas- 
ure that, as I rode down to W Beach on the eve- 
ning of the 26th May, I saw the stately battle- 
ship, the Majestic^ lying at anchor out in the 
roadstead, a few cable lengths from W Beach; 
and as I looked my heart grew glad within me, 
because there lay the ship in the open sea, ex- 
posed to any attack, and I felt that it would be 
impossible for the ship to lie thus unless the 
German submarines which had sunk the other 
battleships a few days previously were either dis- 
posed of, or else some clever new defence had 
been designed which made the Majestic immune 
from the deadly torpedo. 

It was a cheering thought, and it helped to en- 
hance the beauty of the wondrous panorama 
which lay spread before my eyes. 

Away to my left stood the quaint old ruined 
walls and towers of Sedd-el-Balii', thrown into 
bold outline against the rippling waters of the 
Dardanelles, while further on the eye was caught 
by the green plains of Ilium, set in a tangle of 
hills, on the picturesque Asiatic coast. Ahead of 
me, to the south, glittered the soft sea, with Cape 
Helles jutting into it, like a rough brown hand 

[167] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

thxust into a basin of shimmering quicksilver. 
Almost at my feet lay Lancashire Landing, busy 
with its hundreds of men and animals going to 
and fro, while away on my right sparkled the 
^gean, with the Isles of Greece jutting out of 
it, like rugged giants rising from their ocean lair. 
To crown aU, the sun was going down in a per- 
fect blaze of colour, tipping the crests of Imbros 
and Samothrace with a glint of gold, as it sank 
behind them into the sea. I have seen sunsets 
in many parts of the world, but never have I seen 
anything to equal the glorious lights and shades 
which at sundown are painted on the ^gean sky. 
If I were an artist, my ambition would be to go 
in the lovely autumn days on a pilgrimage to 
these shores and humbly try to put on my canvas 
the perfectly gorgeous but harmoniously blended 
rose, pink, scarlet, red, yellow, purple, green, am- 
ber and blue — a perfect intoxication of glorious 
colours which the imagination would be unequal 
to, unless they were absolutely thrown on the sky 
before one's own eyes. The magnificence of the 
sunsets seen from Gallipoli were the sum of what 
an ordinary mortal could conceive as a fitting 
setting for the splendour of God's Throne. 

So it is to be hoped that the officers and crew of 
the Majestic, which was moored so peacefully 

[168] 



THE GERMAN SUBMARINES 

amid such heavenly surroundings, took a soul- 
satisfying view of the glory around them, be- 
cause, alas, for many of the poor fellows it was 
the last sunset that would ever gladden their eyes, 
for on the morning of the 27th the ship was 
marked down by a German submarine and sent 
to its doom within four minutes of being struck. 

I was attending to some routine work in my 
camp when I heard the terrific explosion and, 
looking up, saw a volume of smoke ascending to 
the heavens from W Beach. I jumped on my 
horse, which was ready saddled close by, and 
galloped over to hear what had happened. 
When I topped the rise, all of the Majestic that 
I could see was a couple of dozen feet of its cop- 
per keel which projected above the water, and 
which still remains thus — a mute witness to the 
fact that "some one had blundered." 

Regrettable incidents hke these should be un- 
known in a Navy renowned for the good practi- 
cal commonsense and thoroughness of its cap- 
tains. 



[169] 



CHAPTER XVII 

TEEXCH WAKIARE IN GALLIPOLI 

'"From aU forms of trench warfare, preserve us. 
O Lord I" should l>e the humble prayer of every 
soldier, for it is about the most unpleasant, tire- 
some, humdrmn, disagreeable, dang-erous, death- 
without-glory kind of warfare which the evil 
genius of man a^uld devise. As. however, it has 
ccmie to stay, it may perhaps be of interest to 
describe what it was like in Gallipoh. 

"\^^len, after the tirst battles, the Tiu-ks re- 
fused any longer to meet us in the open, iuid took 
to the trenches, which they had, with great 
energy, dug right across the Peninsula, it be- 
came necessary for us to adopt the s:mie mole- 
like tactics, and our advance was brought prac- 
tically to a stiuidstill. Instead of going ahead a 
couple of miles m a day's light, it now beciune a 
question of taking one trench at a time, and often 
we did not gahi as much as that, even after the 
most strenuous battles. 

Long lines of trenches, from thi*ee to six or 
[i:o] 



TRENCH WARFARE 

more feet deep, and three or four feet wide, were 
dug in zig-zags right across the Peninsuhi, more 
or less parallel to the Turkish lines, and hchind 
these were similar support and reserve trenches; 
at the hack of these again were second and third 
line defence trenches; while still further were 
the so-called rest trenches, hut in Gallipoli these 
were just as dangerous as the front trenches, 
owing to the contined space in which the army 
was cooped up, and also owing to the configura- 
tion of the ground, which exposed them to fii*e 
from ^Vchi Baha as well as from the gmis in x\sia. 
Some of our trenches were so deep that hunckeds 
of scaling ladders were always kept hi readiness 
to enahle the men to swarm out quickly when an 
assault was to he made. Long lines of com- 
munication trenches ran up and down and to 
and fro, comiecting the various hues of trenches, 
and many of these were dug deep enough and 
wide enough to give ample cover for mules and 
horses. A'arious little hack alleys were also dug 
in different directions, so that the whole face of 
the country was transformed into a veritahle rah- 
bit warren. These commimication trenches were 
necessary so that reliefs, reinforcements, mimi- 
tions, food and water could be taken up hi safety 
to the tirmg line. 

[ITI] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Where the ground was very hard and deep 
trenches could not be dug, the necessary cover 
was given by buildmg parapets made of sand- 
bags, little canvas bags about two feet long and 
ten inches across, which could easily be carried 
by one man when filled with sand or clay. These 
sandbags should be of different colours, because 
otherwise when one is taken out to make a loop- 
hole the blank space is seen at once and the 
enemy's fire is concentrated on it. In Gallipoli 
our sandbags were all of the same colour — 
di'ab-coloured canvas. 

When an attack was made and an enemy's 
trench was captured, thousands of these sandbags 
were carried forward, and by piling them up a 
new protective trench was rapidly constructed, 
for, of course, the original Tm'kish trench was 
always battered to pieces (or should have been) 
by high explosive shells before the attack was 
launched. 

Another great use of the sandbag was to 
erect a barrier across an enemy communication 
trench, otherwise, of course, he could pour his 
troops down the communication alley and per- 
haps effect a surprise. It was exceedingly odd 
to see om' sentry on one side of such a barrier 
and the Turkish sentry on the other side, appar- 

[172] 



TRENCH WARFARE 

ently quite friendly in the intervals of bombing 
each other I 

One day a man of the Inniskilling Fusiliers 
played a trick on the Turkish sentry. Finding 
life rather monotonous, and being somewhat fed 
up with bully beef, he bored a hole in his tin, 
stuck a cartridge into it, and hurled the novel 
projectile over the sandbag barrier among the 
Turks, who could be heard flying for their lives 
away from it along the trench, evidently think- 
ing it was some new form of diabohcal bomb we 
had invented. Then one man, a little bolder 
than the rest, could be heard cautiously stalking 
it; he even threw stones at it, and when these 
failed to cause an explosion, he plucked up 
enough courage to hook it towards him with his 
fixed bayonet. It was apparently sent off for 
investigation to some German professor in the 
rear, for some few hours later the Turkish sentry 
shouted out loudly over the parapet: "Bully 
beef, bully beef; throw us more," and this little 
incident led to many friendly exchanges of bully 
or cigarettes. 

Life in the trenches when no "strafe" was on 
was very monotonous — dull, weary watching 
and waiting, with dust blowing into one's eyes 
and mouth and nose all the time, and flies every- 

[173] 



AVITII THE ZIONISTS IN GALLirOLI 

where. While in the trenches food had to be 
snatched when it was possible to get it. It was 
cooked some considerable distance to the rear and 
was then carried up to the trenches in great pots 
and there distribnted, and in Gallipoli, of conrse, 
that meant dividing it between men and flies — 
the latter getting the lion's sliare during the 
months of June, J ul}' and August. 

Of course, work was always going on. The 
trenches had to be carefully drained and sloped 
so as to allow the rainfall to How otf. If this 
were not properly done they would inevitably be 
flooded out in the rains, and life in them would 
be impossible. Even when every care was taken 
they sometimes became raging torrents. jNIuch 
ground was made good by digging out from the 
trenches towards the Turkish lines and forming 
a fresh line of trenches closer to the enemy and 
in a better position. 

Every yard in front of the trenches was 
guarded b}- barbed wire, sometimes left unrolled 
on the ground, where it naturally goes into coils 
and traps for the unwary, and sometimes inter- 
laced on stakes, like a regular wire fencing, 
doubled many times. It was very dangerous 
w^ork putting up this form of defence, and it was 
generally done at night, but even then the enemy 



THKXCir VVAIiFAIiE 

could see our men f>y the light of iJjc })riJJiant 
flares wJiicIi wtt(^ constantly sent up, for these 
remained in the air for several seconds, inaking 
everything as hriglit as day. "J'lie only charice 
of escape then was to lie flat down and remain 
perfectly still until the flare went fjut. 

'J'hen there was the constant arduous and dan- 
gerous lahour of sapping, i. e., tunnelling under- 
ground from our trenches underneath the 'J'urk- 
ish trenches, making a huge cavity there, filling 
it with explosives and blowing the trencli and 
such Tuiks as wi:v(^ in it sky high. This was 
generally done when an attack was made, so as 
to throw the enemy into greater ccjnfusion. 

At night it was usual to man the front trenches 
fairly strongly, one-third of the force always be- 
ing awake and on the look-out for the enemy. 

Of course, it was almost certain death for a 
man to stand up and show his head and shoulders 
above the parapet line, so the watch on the enemy 
was kept by men with periscopes, wlio could 
see every move in perfect safety. Kven the 
periscopes were often shattered to pieces by the 
bullets of llie Turks, which shows that some of 
them were gcxjf] marksmen. 

Telephone wires were laid everywhere in the 
trenches, and telephone operators and observing 

[175] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

officers were scattered up and down the line. 
On the first sign of an enemy attack these of- 
ficers communicated with their Batteries in the 
rear, and within two seconds a curtain of fire was 
rained on the advancing foe, which, in most cases, 
he found it quite impossible to get through. If 
he ever succeeded, however, the Infantry weve by 
this time lining the parapets, ready to mow down 
the enemy with rifle and machine-gun fire, so the 
onl}' marvel is that any of the assaulting force 
ever got through. A very rare occurrence — and 
those that did pierce the line never again got 
back to their own trenches. 

One day I went up to visit Lieutenant David- 
son, who was Forward Observing Officer, and 
he, having occasion to fire a gun, telephoned to 
the Battery; it was a distinctly weird feeling to 
hear the scream of the shell from the guns two 
miles back flying close over our heads into the 
Turkish trenches in front of us, ahnost before 
Davidson had ceased speaking! iVt that same 
observation post, on a previous day, another R. 
II. A. officer, Lieutenant Perceval, who also was 
a member of oin* little mess, had a very narrow 
escape. A Turkish shell came through, slightly 
bruised his shoulder, and killed his Bombardier, 
who was, at the moment, holding the telephone. 

[176] 



TRENCH WARFARE 

In the side of the trench next the enemy httle 
niches were excavated where men could he and 
sit fairly well sheltered from wind and rain. 
These recesses were often used by the Turks as 
burial places for their dead. I remember on one 
occasion I was walking along a jnece of the line 
which we had just taken from the Turks when 
a shell exploded close to the trench. The con- 
cussion shook away some loose earth and out 
from the side of the trench popped a dead hand 
and arm! — just as if a policeman had put out 
his hand to stop the traffic. The dead Turk 
seemed to try, even in death, to bar the way to 
an enemy's approach. 

A very disagreeable feature of trench life is 
the unpleasant odour of the dead, which pene- 
trates everywhere, for, of course, when an attack 
is made by one side or the other hundreds may be 
killed close to the trenches, and as a rule it is 
impossible either to rescue the wounded or to 
bury the dead, because the enemy would inevi- 
tably shoot down any one attempting such a 
task. 

One of the very worst trials of trench war- 
fare is to see the dead body of a comrade lying 
out in the open, gradually fading away before 
one's eyes, a mummied hand still clutching the 

[177] 



WiriT TTTK ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOIJ 

rifle, tlic helmet n little way olV, Uioking ever so 
weird in its gruesome surrouiulings. 

AVhile in the trenehes one is, of eourse, suh- 
jeet nt all times to shells, rifle Are, mine explo- 
sions, poison gas, bombs, liquid lire, and other 
diabolieal inventions. The Turks, however, did 
not use eitlier poison gas or liquid tire, and, of 
eourse, neither did the British. 

Worst trial of all is the treneh mortar! This 
venomous weapon sends a bomb weighing a hun- 
dred pounds or more of the most deadly high ex- 
j>losive plumb into the midst of a treneh w^th 
marvellous aecuraey at any range up \o four 
hundred yards. The vieious thing ean be seen 
soaring high up into the air, until it reaehes a 
}ioint direetly overhead, then it hovers for a mo- 
ment, like a hawk over its prey, and Anally 
swoi^ps down, pulverising everybody and every- 
thing near whieh it explodes. 

From my o>\n observation of trench warfare 
I would say unhesitatingly that no assault should 
be launehed against the enemy until his trenehes 
had been thoroughly poundeil to pieces by high 
explosive, his men demoralised by a constant 
stream of shells, and all wire entanglements or 
other barriers swept out of the way of the ad- 
vance. Then, and then only, should the infantry 

[ITS]* 



TRENCH WARFARE 

attack be launched, but before doing so the sup- 
ports and reserves should be brought up as close 
as possible to the firing line, because, in these 
days especially, the speed with which an assault 
can be reinforced makes all the difference be- 
tween victory and defeat. 

During the assault the guns should be con- 
stantly playing on the reserve trenches of the 
enemy, the counter batteries (i. e., those batteries 
told off to dominate enemy batteries) firing as 
fast as they possibly can to keep down enemy 
shrapnel fire and generally supporting the at- 
tack in every possible way. Sjiccial groups 
should always be told off (not single individ- 
uals) with orders to signal back to the batteries 
the position which the front line has reached In 
the assault, otherwise — and I have seen it hap- 
pen more than once — our own guns will be found 
playing on our own men. 

It is unwise to trust to telej^hone wires for 
passing signals back to the batteries, for they are 
often cut by shells or broken by passing troops. 
Aeroplanes fitted with wireless are most useful. 
Another good j^lan is to fasten some very con- 
spicuous object, such as a large tin disc, to the 
backs of the men, so that the gunners would al- 
ways be able to tell at whom they were firing. 

[179] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

The disc should be tied so that the men could 
switch it round to the front if they were forced 
to retire. This plan was adopted in Gallipoli 
towards the end of July with excellent results, 
for our men could alwaj^s be made out by the 
flashing of the tin, which, of course, the enemy 
could not see. 

Bombs should always be carried with the as- 
saulting colmmis, and the bomb tlu'owers should 
not be hampered by a rifle, but should only be 
armed with revolver and bayonet, for when their 
stock of bombs is expended there are always 
plenty of rifles lying around belonging to the 
dead and badly wounded. 

When all these arrangements have been com- 
pleted, and a combined attack is made with shells, 
machine-guns, rifle fire, trench mortars, poison 
gas, liquid fire, etc., the attack is almost certain 
to succeed at some point or other, and once the 
defender's line is broken his whole line is threat- 
ened, and if the reserves are brought up and 
poured quickly enough into the breach, so as to 
get a wedge in between the enemy's forces, his 
army can then be smashed up in detail and a 
great victory won. 

Cavaby can then burst through and once more 
come into their own by playing havoc with the 

[180] 



TRENCH WARFARE 

enemy's line of communication. Of course, in 
Gallipoli we had no Cavalry; at least, such 
mounted men as we had came as Infantry with- 
out horses ! and I must say that they fought well, 
those yeomen from Bucks and Kent — the only 
pity is that we did not have more of them. 
When we did make a breach in the enemy's line, 
we never had enough troops to push tlirough and 
so ensure a crushing victory. 



[181] 



CHAPTER XVIII 

GUNS AND STATF 

The losses which we suffered in every attack on 
the Turkish trenches were very severe, and it was 
painful to see our men frittered away time after 
time in these hopeless assaults on what had now 
become an impregnable position — impregnable 
at all events to such forces as we could launch to 
the attack. Our casualties at the original land- 
ing had reduced the 29th Division to a mere skele- 
ton. 3Iany of the Battalions were not a com- 
pany strong and had scarcely any officers left, 
and it was fomid necessary to join the renmants 
of two or three together to make one rather weak 
Battalion. The Dublins and 3Iunsters were 
thus linked up together and were officially known 
as the "Dubsters." 

Reinforcements only came in by driblets, and 
as they came they were eaten up in futile attacks 
on the strong' trenches which the Turks had mean- 
Mhile, with great energy, dug right across the 
Peninsula. 

We were never really strong enough to under- 
take a serious offensive, and our guns never had 

[lS-2] 



GUNS AND STAFF 

ammunition enough to prepare the way properly 
by a devastating bombardment. Half an hour 
or an hour was usually about all we were able to 
do in the way of knocking the Turkish trenches 
about with high explosive, whereas these same 
trenches needed a steady rain of shells for several 
days to crumple them up and destroy the scores 
of machine-guns which bristled everywhere. 
Trench warfare seemed to have taken us com- 
pletely by surprise ; we were without trench mor- 
tars, but luckily were able to borrow some from 
the French; neither had we any bombs or hand 
grenades, except such as we could manufacture 
locally out of jam tins! 

No battery commander was allowed to fire a 
single round unless he had first obtained permis- 
sion from his Brigadier, and even when a couple 
of battalions of Turkish troops well within range 
could be observed marching in column, the Briga- 
dier was compelled to limit the battery to two 
rounds only, for to such dire straits were we re- 
duced owing to lack of ammunition! 

Even with the slight support given by the guns 
I have seen our gallant fellows time after time 
leap out of their trenches and, in an irresistible 
onslaught with the bayonet, sweep over trench 
upon trench full of Turkish soldiers. Nowhere 

[183] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX UAl llTOll 

could the eiioiny stand up to our men in the open. 
as '^rss proveii over and over again in the early 
days of the llglit Wfore tlu y t<.vk to tronoh war- 
fare. If only we had had enoug^li anmiunition 
and one more Division, ei^ual to the *29th. we 
would have retrieved the initial mistake of land- 
ing at llelles, and have swept the Turks over 
Aohi Baba from their positions nnmd the Xar- 
n^ws, and Constantinople itself would have boon 
in our grip within a month. 

But, alas! we hadn't the ammunition and we 
liadn't the men; and when the Turks t«.x^k to mole 
tactics, and pro>teetod their fn^nt with those two 
hiventions of the Evil One — barl>ed wire and 
machine-gims — o>ur ease. c<.>nsidering the means 
at our disposal, was a hopeless one. 

During a lierce battle which toe<k place in June. 
I was standing close to one of our batteries in 
position, just south of the Pink Farm, and what 
a c<.^ntrast it was to see these guns in action after 
having repeatedly watched the French .7»>s! 
Here was no smixtth barrel-recoil, but a clumsy 
spade stuck in the gnnrnd to prevent the piece 
fn^n kieking. Whenever the gun was tm\l it 
jumped baek like a bueking broncho, necessitat- 
ing tlie relaying of the gun after each shot. 

AVe have better guns than that now, of course. 

[1S41 



GUNS AND STAFF 

but with all our niccliaulcjil sujjcriority and ine- 
chttuic'ul resources we should years ago have had 
a gun o(|ual, or superior, to the French .7^). Of 
course there is no use in lun Ing a (|uiek-(iilng gnu 
if you cannot have nionnlnins of aniniunitiou 
alongside of it, and this ])oinl should never be 
lost sight of by the Stall", whose duty it is to look 
al'ter such matters. 

As we were very short of high explosive shells 
the battery av;is not doing a great deal of firing, 
and in the lull a SlalT Oilieer rode up and told 
the l^attery Connnander to lay his guns on to 
some Turks whom he pointed out, saying they 
were threatening our line. 

Now I had been watching this part of the bat- 
tlefield most carefully through my glasses, and I 
had seen our own men advance and go into the 
l)osition which the Staff Officer said was held by 
the Turks. I overheard his instructions to the 
gunner officer, so I called out: *'Those are our 
men, not Turks 1" However, in spite of my 
warning, a coui)le of roimds were loosed off, and 
they Avcre only too well placed, for they cxplodeil 
among our unfortunate troops, doing, no doubt, 
a considerable amount of damage, because, in a 
moment, a wrathful telephone message came to 
the Battery Commander telling him to cease fire 

[185] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

iiistantly, on which the discreet Staff Officer 
made a hurried departure. 

While we had some excellent Staff Officers, 
there were others not exactly noted for their bril- 
liancy, and no doubt the Turks saw that some of 
our "regrettable incidents" were due to bad Staff 
work, and the following story was vouched for 
by the Peninsula wag. 

It had been noted with some surprise that, 
though the Turkish sniper exacted his toll from 
all other ranks, the Staff appeared to be immune. 
At last the mystery was solved when one of these 
sharpshooters was captured, for on being asked 
how it was that the Staff always escaped, he 
replied: "Oh, well, you see, I get five shillings 
for every private I shoot, ten shillings for every 
sergeant, a pound for every officer, but if I were 
to shoot a Staff' Officer I would be shot myself!" 

I need hardly say that these merry quips made 
at the expense of the Staff by our frolicsome wits 
should be taken with a grain of salt. So far as 
my own experience goes, the Staff Officers of the 
29th Division, and, later, of the 8tli Army Corps, 
were all that could be desired, and at them no such 
gibe could be levelled. All those with whom I 
came in contact were very much all there at then* 
respective jobs. 

[186] 



GUNS AND STAFF 

There is no doubt, however, that there is some 
reason for the general lack of confidence in the 
Staff. Responsible positions are unfortunately 
too often given to most unsuitable men, with re- 
grettable results. 

Glaring instances of jobbery and favouritism 
are so universally known that it is unnecessary to 
quote exami)les. Puck must be having the time 
of his life. If only our responsible administra- 
tors would for the future abjure nepotism (vain 
wish!) and give proved talent a chance, we should, 
I am convinced, have something better to show 
than "strategic retreats" and "brilliant evacua- 
tions." 

I am reminded of an incident that occurred 
when I was staying with Colonel Roosevelt 
during the time he was President of the United 
States. An influential and well-known Senator 
came into the room while I was there, and urged 
on the President the claims of a protege of his to 
a post as Mining Inspector. President Roose- 
velt's reply impressed me very much: "Well, 
Senator, if your man is the best Mining Engi- 
neer that can be found in the United States he 
shall get the job, but not otherwise; he will have 
the lives of men in his hands." 

Mark this, ye jobbites of England! 
[187] 



CHAPTER XIX 

VISITS TO THE TRENCHES 

During one of the hot June days Gye and I 
paid a visit to Colonel Bruce and his Gurkhas, 
who were holding the left of the hne down by the 
iEgean Sea. 

The Gurkhas have done some splendid work 
in the Peninsula. They are in their element 
when out at night doing reconnoitring work. 
Bruce told me of the valuable report brought in 
by one of his X. C. O.'s, on the strength of which 
he took his men up the side of a cliff and was able 
to surprise and drive the Turks out of a very 
strong position which it was of prime importance 
we should hold. Other troops had several times 
attempted this feat, but failed because they at- 
tacked in the open, while the Gurkhas succeeded 
owing to good reconnoitring work. 

The night previous to our visit the Turks had 
made a most determined attack on the Gurkhas, 
and the Gurkhas asked for no better sport. 
Flares, shot up by our officers, showed the Turks 
advancing m regular parade formation in hne of 

[iss] 



VISITS TO THE TRENCHES 

columns. As soon as the Turks saw that they 
had been observed, they charged, yelhng their 
war cry: "Allah, Allah!" The Gurkhas waited 
patiently, lining the trenches as thickly as they 
could stand. They allowed the Turks to ap- 
proach within about fifty yards of them and then 
opened such a hurricane of rifle and machine-gun 
fire that the Turks were absolutely crumpled up 
in ranks as they stood. The fury of the Gurkhas 
was now thoroughly aroused and, the reserves 
having been brought up, the whole brigade made 
such an onslaught that practically not a single 
Turk out of that huge attacking force ever got 
back to his own trench. 

When Rolo and I viewed the battlefield within 
a few hours of the fight, there were still some 
wounded to be seen in the intervening ground be- 
tween the two forces, while in regular battle array 
lay line upon line of Turkish dead, silent wit- 
nesses to the terribly accurate fire poured into 
them by the Gurkhas. They are brave fellows, 
those Turks, and it was a sad sight to see so many 
gallant men laid low. 

No doubt in revenge for the defeat they had 
suffered the previous night, the Turks were bom- 
barding the Gurkha lines vigorously, and while I 
was there they landed a big "Black Maria" shell 

[189] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLl 

underneath a little fellow who was squatting on 
his heels outside his dug-out. Tt was an extraor- 
dinary sight to see him shoot down the hill in this 
position and land some forty feet away in a 
elump o^ bushes, from whieh he emerged not 
mueh the worse for his involunt^iry flight. 

The Gurkhas, in one o\' their pi*evious attacks 
on the heights occupied hy the Turks, were held 
up by some barbed wire and had to retire. A 
private soldier, however, chose to remain behind, 
ensconced under the scanty protection of a cou- 
ple of knapsacks, which he pulled together from 
those strewn round, thinking that he could hold 
his own until another assault was delivered by 
his comrades, when he would join them. Xo 
comrades came, however, so he found himself 
unable to move without beino- observed. He 
therefore pretended to be dead and lay abso- 
lutely still for hours, not even daring to move 
his head, except, when his neck got very stitf, 
and then only by pushing his hat up a fraction of 
an inch, so that he might slowly twist his head in- 
side it without showing any movement. At last 
he could stand the strain no longer, so he leaped 
up. raced in a zig-zag to his own trenches amid a 
hail of bullets, and, carefully avoiding a low spot 
where the Turks had concentrated their tire, ex- 

[IPO] 



VISITS TO THE TRENCHES 

pecting him to go in that way, he leaped over the 
higliest part of the parajiet and eseaped scot-free. 

I saw tliis httle fellow a few hours after his 
exploit and he looked as though he had thoroughly 
enjoyed the adventure. 

A few days after the big Turkish assault I was 
again on my way to this part of the line, when I 
hajjpened to meet General de IJsle, and, on men- 
tioning that I was going to see Colonel Bruee, he 
told me I would not find him, for he had been 
wounded on the jirevious night by a bomb, while 
gallantly leading his men. 

I had several friends in the Inniskilling Fusi- 
liers and frequently I eame across them in my 
journeys to and from the Gurkha lines. As a 
rule, they held the trenches to the right of the lit- 
tle brown men from Nepaul. 

I always made a point, when I was anywhere 
near, of looking up Captain Gordon Tillie. He 
was now practically the only officer left of the 
Inniskillings who had taken part in the original 
landing and had, so far, escaped scot-free. I was 
hopeful that his luck would see him through, be- 
cause he had only been married a few days before 
he left England for the front, and I knew his wife 
very well, and had promised her to look him up 
whenever I had an opportunity. 

[191] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Just before the 29tli Division went to Suvla, 
Gye and I paid him a visit, while he was holding 
the front trenches, and, sad to say, this was the 
last occasion on which I ever saw Gordon Tillie. 
He took us along that portion of the trench for 
which his company was responsible, and showed 
us the various points of interest in the Turkish 
hne, which, at this particular place, was some- 
times parallel, and sometimes almost at right 
angles to our trenches, and in places only a dozen 
yards distant. l^Hien I was leaving him he cau- 
tioned me to be careful of a certain part of the 
trench we should have to pass through, as he said 
it was exposed to the Turkish guns and they often 
gave it a ''strafing." JNIy parting remark to him 
was : "Take care they don't 'strafe' you." 

Of course, shells were dropping here and there 
all the time from the Turkish gims, and they were 
paying some attention to the piece of dangerous 
trench which Gye and I were bound to go 
through, so, saying to him: "Let's make a bolt 
for it," we started off at our best pace, but before 
we got through we had to lie down in the bottom 
of the trench to escape a couple of shells which 
burst all round us and knocked to pieces the sand- 
bag parapet protecting our heads. 

Gordon Tillie's friendly warning may have 

[192] 



VISITS TO THE TRENCHES 

saved our lives, and it is a nice thought, for, soon 
afterwards, the 29th Division were sent to Suvla, 
and there Captain TiUie was killed while gal- 
lantly leading his company up the slopes of Sari 
Bair — a brave soldier, as Sir Ian Hamilton testi- 
fies in his Suvla Bay Despatch. 

I often made an expedition to visit a friend, 
only to find, when I got there, that he had perhaps 
been killed the day before, or else had been sent 
off to hospital badly wounded, and it was sad to 
see how one's friends gradually got thinned off. 
Many of them lay buried all round. One would 
suddenly be startled by coming across a freshly- 
dug grave in some sheltered little nook by the 
wayside and learn for the first time, from the rude 
cross erected over it, that one's friend lay there. 
But war is war, and as a shell or bullet may come 
at any moment and bring sudden death with it to 
one's self, one gets used to the idea, and somehow 
it does not seem so dreadful. Many of us often 
escaped by the merest chance. In my own case 
the turning aside to pluck a flower, or straying a 
little from the path to get a better view of a sun- 
set, was the chance that prevented Death from 
finding me, because more than once I have seen a 
shell explode and excavate a huge hole on the 
exact spot where, had I not turned aside, I would 

[193] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

undoubtedly have been standing. Yes, indeed, 
in those days, one often heard, sounding softly 
in one's ears, the faint rustle of the wings of the 
Angel of Death. 

I do not know whether the Turks had any par- 
ticular spite against my Zionists, but they cer- 
tainh gave us more than our fair share of shells. 
One afternoon they began a bombardment and 
plumped a shell into a bank on which sat a Zion 
man. Private Scorobogaty. The explosion sent 
him some feet into the air, but, beyond the bruise 
and shock, he suffered no damage. The next 
shell dropped plump in the middle of our little 
supply of stores, within six feet of the door of our 
dugout, and sent everything flying through 
space. A third shot plunged into the roots of a 
tree which stood close to our lines, bj^ which the 
trumpeter of L Battery, R. H. A., was standing. 
He heard the shell coming, and, without any 
particular reason, but luckity for him, he made a 
dive to the right instead of to the left, and so 
escaped for the moment. Next afternoon at 
tea-time another shell came, cut the same tree 
clean in two, wounding the trumpeter and two 
other men of L Battery, who were having their 
tea in its shade. 

[194] 



CHAPTER XX 

FLIES, DUST AND BATTLE 

July was a scorching month, and to add to the 
discomfort of heat there was a plague of flies; 
flies, flies, flies everywhere, and I have no doubt 
that they were responsible for the serious epi- 
demics which broke out among the troops. 
Doubtless it was the self -same pestilence which 
Homer tells us attacked the Grecian Army 
camped round Troy, and which they attributed to 
the anger of Apollo, though none of our mules 
suffered as did those of the Greeks. 

These flies were disgusting, horrible pests, for 
they would come straight from the rotting 
corpses of the Turks, which lay in unburied hun- 
dreds in front of our trenches, and blacken every 
scrap of food on which they could obtain a foot- 
hold. The only way to get a clean bite into one's 
mouth, without taking the flies with it, was to 
blow vigorously all the time until the lips had 
actually closed on the morsel, and even then 
these pests would hover round, waiting for a 
chance opening to dart in and chase it down. 

[195] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

The dust, too, in these days was very trying, for 
the whole peninsula was now one vast dust heap, 
which the slightest wind would swirl about in 
blinding, choking clouds. I noticed that on sev- 
eral occasions oiu* men had to do battle with this 
dust storm blowing directly in their eyes, so that 
it was impossible to see anything in front of them, 
while the Tm*ks, with their backs to it, could see 
our men coming along plainly enough and could 
slate them at their leisure. I always found, as 
was to be expected, that when we foolishly at- 
tacked on such days as these we etfected nothing 
bevond gettin^: oui'selves killed. The Tin-ks 
must have marvelled at our blind folly. 

I well remember that one of our most success- 
ful battles was fought on a day when the wmd 
carried the dust nito the faces of the Turks; to- 
wards the close of this tight I saw a couple of 
battahons go right through and over all the 
Turkish trenches within sight, and then get en- 
gulfed in a great ravine on the very slope of 
Achi Baba itself, where they wei-e hidden from 
view, and then I saw thousands of Turks stream 
do\^^l tlu'ough conunmiication trenches on each 
side of oiu* men, filling the trenches in their rear, 
as could be plainly seen by the bristling bayonets 
which showed above the parapets. 

[196] 



FLIES, DUST AND BATTLE 

I felt that these two hattalions were lost, as in- 
deed they were for two or three days, but some- 
how or other, after some extraordinary hide-and- 
seek experiences among the Turkish trenches, 
they fought their way back again, clearing the 
Turks out of their path, in hand-to-hand fight- 
ing, as they hacked their way back to our own 
lines. 

A friend of mine, Captain Braham of the 6th 
Manchesters, had a narrow escape on one occasion 
when he made an attempt to lead his men in an 
assault. Being short of ammunition for the 
guns, the Turkish trenches had not been properly 
bombarded; Turkish machine-guns and riflemen 
were still in position, ready to mow our men down 
the moment they leaped from their trenches. 
This was tlie fate which overtook the 6th Man- 
chesters; they were practically cut to pieces before 
they had advanced more than a dozen yards from 
their lines, and the few survivors thought it 
wiser to get back to cover as quickly as possible. 
Captain Braham, however, tried to rally them out 
of the trench again, and at that moment, while 
standing on the parapet, a bullet struck his knap- 
sack, cut through the buckle, a box of chocolate 
and a tin-opener. The tin-opener diverted the 
bullet out through the bottom of the haversack by 

[197] 



WITH THE ZIOXISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

his heels, but the impact of it was so great that it 
knocked him off the parapet into the trench, as if 
he had been struck with a sledge hanmier. He 
told me afterwards that he did not know at the 
time what had knocked him over, and it was not 
until he had removed his haversack that the mys- 
tery was explained. 

During one of these dog days Rolo and I went 
as far forward as it was possible to go, so that we 
might get a close view of a battle which was to 
begin at 11 a. m. on the 12th of July. 

Punctually to the minute our guns crashed out 
along the line and pounded away steadily for an 
hour. Then we watched the attack, and what im- 
pressed me in this battle, as it did also in others, 
was the inadequate force with which we attempted 
to take the offensive. A line of our men would 
dash forward, take two or three Turkish 
trenches, losing perhaps half its effective 
streng-th in so doing, and then find itself too weak 
to do more than hold on, and very often they 
could not even do tliat. There seemed to be no 
regular system of sending line after hne at inter- 
vals into the fight. I know that this was ar- 
ranged for in orders, but it did not always come 
off, and the men who had, with such gallantry and 
at such a cost, taken the trenches, would be forced 

[198] 



FIJKS, DUST AND JiA^I'l'I.K 

out of them in a counter-attack by overwhelming 
nurnhers of Turk.s, and, in getting hack to their 
own h"ne.s, would again lose heavily. 

'J'o ohtain a view of the hattlefield from a dif- 
ferent point we made our way along a communi- 
cation trench, and here our interest in the fight in 
the front was abruptly switched oflp and centred 
on ourselves, for the Turks had spotted a Bat- 
talion of fianeashire J^'usilicrs corning along to 
reinforce the firing line, and they tinned a most 
deadly and accurate fire upon us from the Turk- 
ish guns. Shells hopped from the parapets or 
broke them in all round us, crashed over our 
heads, and even plumped right into the trench 
itself, sending men fiyirjg in all directions. 

The Jianeashire Fusiliers had, therefore, to 
halt and take cover under the lee of the parapet, 
and during this time one of the men asked Claude 
Rolo what his job was in these parts, for, being 
in our shirt-sleeves, and pretty grimy with dust 
and with climbing about the trenches, he could 
not make out who or what we were. 

When llolo replied: "Oh, I've only come to 
see the show," *'0h, Hell," said the Ijancashire 
man, "you must be mad to come to a show like 
this on your own." 

I felt very sorry for the poor lads when they 

[199] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX G.VLLIPOLI 

tinally marched off. The day was hot enough to 
make one feel that the only way to keep cool was 
to sit in one's bones under the shade of a tree, and 
yet here were tliese Lancasliire men loaded down 
with the whole weight of their packs — food, am- 
munition, blanket, belts, bayonet and rrfle — 
marching on through this infernal heat to a 
bloody combat, where they would have to put 
fortli all their efforts in getting rapidly across the 
fire-swept ground, plunge into and out of deep 
trenches, and, in addition, grapple hand to hand 
with no mean foe. 

Some things are more than hmnan nature can 
stand. You cannot overload the soldier, and 
then expect him to pull his full weight in battle 
with the broiling sun burning out his throat. 

The Lancashire lads were soon in the thick of 
the fight, and a great many never again needed 
the shelter of a friendly trench. 

We lost a few prisoners to the Turks in this 
battle owing to exhaustion, and it is a comfort to 
know that our gallant enemies treat such men of 
ours as fall into their hands with kinthiess. I 
never heard anything but praise for the Turk and 
tlie way he played the game. I only knew of one 
case of a prisoner being mutilated, and this may 
have been the work of a German, for the victim 

[200] 



FLIES, DUST AND BATTLE 

was a Sikh, and died before any evidence could 
be taken. The Turk is a clean fighter, and more 
than once they have pointed out to us that they 
would be glad if wc would move a hospital ship a 
little further from the transports, for they feared 
that in firing at the latter they might hit the hos- 
pital, and, so far as the records go, this is more 
than would have been done by the Germans. 

Among the prisoners taken in one of these bat- 
tles were some German sailors from the Goehen, 
who had been working the machine-guns. When 
taken they had no more ammunition left, their 
officer and many others had been killed, and their 
position was quite hopeless, so they gladly sur- 
rendered. They looked crestfallen and sullen 
when I saw them as prisoners on their way to the 
beach. 

During these hot July days the Turkish shells 
would often set fire to the dried-up gorse and 
bracken near our lines, and, as the wind usually 
came from the north, I have seen a raging line of 
fire, hundreds of yards long, with flames forty 
feet high, roaring and crackling down to our 
trenches. 

Our men, however, had taken the precaution of 
cutting gorse down in front, so that the fire never 
actually overwhelmed our lines. 

[201] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

The Turks did not lack initiative; their sni- 
pers gave us a considerable amount of trouble all 
the time we were on the Peninsula. Two of 
these men obtained some celebrity by their daring 
and originality. They actually concealed them- 
selves between some of our guns, and before they 
were hmited down and shot they had killed and 
wounded several of our officers and men. They 
were painted green all over, face, hands, clothes, 
and even their rifles, while little green bushes, 
similar to the gorse around, were tied to their 
heads. 

Their sense of humour showed itself in some 
rather quaint ways. Once, when a bomb was 
thrown over a barricade by a French soldier, hit- 
ting a Turk on the head without exploding, the 
latter shouted back "Assassin, Assassin!" On 
another occasion, on the completion of one of the 
heaviest bombardments to which we had sub- 
jected their trenches — a perfect storm of shells 
from field guns, siege guns, howitzers and battle- 
ships — as soon as the firing ceased and the dust 
cleared awaj% a huge placard was slowly raised 
from the front trench, on which was printed in 
large letters "No Casualties." 



[202] 



CHAPTER XXI 

WORK OF THE ZION MULE CORPS 

During all these battles in May, June and July, 
the Zion men and mules were kept steadily at 
work, and wherever they went it was gratifying 
to know that they performed their duties satisfac- 
toril}^ Sometimes little parties of them would 
be attached to different battalions, and when 
their tour of a week or ten days' duty was over 
they would invariably bring back a letter from 
the Transport Officer to say how well the men 
had worked, and how well they had behaved when 
under fire. I have dozens of such letters, which 
testify to their good work and how well they got 
on with their British comrades, with whom they 
were great favourites; the party commanded by 
Corporal Nehemiah Yahuda was always in great 
request, as this bright, cheery young N. C. O. had 
a happy knack of inspiring his men with his own 
zeal for work and devotion to duty, regardless of 
all danger. 

Sometimes while away from Headquarters on 

[203] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

these detached duties a iiian would get killed. 
His comrades always brought the body back to 
canip, and then the whole Corps attended the 
funeral, which was a very solemn ceremony. 
Over the grave of each hero whom we buried in 
Gallipoli was erected a little memorial, the Shield 
of David, with his name and the date of his death 
engraved underneath. Nothing brought the old 
days of the Bible back more vividly to my mind 
than to see, when one of my Zion men was 
wounded, how his friends would literally fall on 
his neck, weep, and embrace him most tenderly. 
The outward expression of such emotion as I 
have witnessed is of com'se impossible for us 
Westerners, but I doubt if our feelings are not 
harrowed all the more by the rigid restraint which 
we perforce place on them. 

The gallant Captain Trumpledor differed 
from his compatriots in this respect, and I never 
once saw him give way to any of these emotions. 
On the contrary, he would remark to me over 
the body of a badly wounded Zionist: "Ken, 
ken! (Hebrew for "Yes, yes!") A la guerre 
eommc a la guerre T And I must say that he 
himself bore a bullet W'omid through his shoulder 
w^itli the greatest fortitude, carrying out his 
duties as if nothing had happened and absolutely 

[201] 



WORK OF THE ZION MULE CORPS 

refusing to go into hospital. I am glad to say 
he made a speedy and good recovery. 

A couple of my Zionists were not quite so brave 
as the Captain, for I observed them one day, when 
we were being somewhat heavily shelled, making 
tracks for the beach for all they were worth. 

Their flight reminded me of a story which I had 
heard, of an Irish soldier at the Battle of the 
Boyne, who, relating to a friend how his Captain, 
before leading them to the charge, said: "Now, 
boys, strike for your King, your country, and 
your home." "Some of the fools," said the Irish- 
man, "struck for their King and country, but I 
struck for home!" 

I am glad to say that the valour shown by some 
of my men made up for the lack of it shown by 
others. No one could be a braver or a better sol- 
dier than Nissel Rosenberg, who, through shot 
and shell, led his mules with their loads of ammu- 
nition right into the firing line, when all others, 
both Jewish and British — for both were there — 
made a strategic and hurried movement to the 
rear. I was watching this myself, and, as I con- 
sidered it very plucky of him to go forward with 
his much-needed loads of ammunition, while men 
were being killed all round him, I recommended 
him for the D. C. M., a distinction he well de- 

[205] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

serves. He escaped all wounds that day, but a 
fortnight later, when agam on his way to the 
trenches, he was severely ^vounded by a piece of 
shell; I am glad to say he made a good recov- 
ery and is still going strong. In appreciation of 
his gallant services, I promoted him to the rank 
of sergeant. 

It must not be supposed that we only came 
under fire on specific occasions. It broke upon 
us at all times, night and day, without warning. 
In these '"strafes," as we used to call them, many 
men and mules were killed and wounded. 

During one such "strafe," I can even now see 
Gye and myself running across a couple of hun- 
dred yards of fire-swept ground to the rescue of 
two stricken men, and I should not like to say the 
number of times we both had to throw ourselves 
down and grovel on the ground, while shells 
plunged round us, making holes big enough for 
our graves and covering us with dirt and gravel. 
We luckily got through without a scratch and 
helped to get the wounded men removed, as fast 
as ever we could, out of danger. 

Both were very badly injured, and I never 
expected to see either of them alive again; one, 
indeed, Corporal Frank Abraliam, died soon 

[206] 



WORK OF THE ZION MULE CORPS 

after we got him to the hospital; the other, who 
seemed even more severely wounded, with two 
bullets through his back, and his thigh smashed to 
pulp, I was surprised to find in a fair way to re- 
covery, when I visited my sick and wounded men 
in hospital during a recruiting trip to Alexandria. 
The poor fellow, when he saw me, seized my hand 
and embarrassed me by covering it with kisses, 
saying that but for my lifting him out of that dan- 
gerous fire-zone he would certainly have been 
killed. I was surprised to see that the man re- 
membered that I had been there to help him, as 
he was in such agony at the time that I did not 
think he would have remembered or known what 
was going on around him. I reminded him that 
he owed quite as much gratitude to Lieutenant 
Gye as to me, for we had both helped to get him 
away. 

I must mention here, however, that, as a rule, 
Gye would take on much greater risks to rescue 
a mule than a man, for which on one occasion he 
was highly commended by General Hunter- Wes- 
ton. 

Many of the Zionists whom I had thought 
somewhat lacking in courage showed themselves 
fearless to a degree when under heavy fire, while 

[207] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Captain Triinipledor actually revelled in it, and 
the hotter it became the more he liked it, and 
would remark: "All, it is now plus gai!'* 

It must not be supposed that all the Zionists 
were saints, or that I did not have my times of 
trouble and difficulty with them, because some 
would occasionally murmur and hanker after the 
"flesh-pots of Egypt." They were, indeed, true 
descendants of those forefathers of theirs who 
wandered in the wilderness, and whom INIoses had 
so often to chide severel}- for their stiff -necked- 
ness. Xow jMoses, in his dealings with his trou- 
blesome children, had a tremendous pull over me, 
because, when my men grumbled about lack of 
water, I could strike no rock and make it gush 
forth for them, neither when the meat and food 
were scarce could I call down manna or quails 
from Heaven, nor was there any black cloud to 
interpose and hide us from the devastating fire 
of our enemy. Although JNIoses had these Divine 
aids, yet his task in shepherding over half a mil- 
lion of people through a barren wilderness was 
truty gigantic and could only be compared to 
mine as the ocean to a bucket of water ; with that 
great example before me I felt it was up to me 
not to fail in shepherding through our trials the 
little host confided to my charge, so, like Father 

[208] 



WORK OF THE ZION MULE CORPS 

O'Flynn with his flock, I kept my children in 
order by: 

"Checkin' the crazy ones, 
Coaxin' unaisy ones, 
Liftin' the lazy ones on with the stick." 

I found that the racial characteristic of the Is- 
raelite made it necessary to hold him in with a 
thread light as silk and yet strong as a steel cable, 
and it required a tremendous amount of tact and 
personal influence to weather the various little 
storms which sometimes threatened to wreck our 
family life. 

There was great excitement amongst the Zion- 
ists when I told them that the much coveted re- 
ward for bravery, the Distinguished Conduct 
Medal, had arrived from England for Corporal 
Groushkousky, and had been forwarded to me by 
the Commander-in-Chief. The Corps was pa- 
raded in the afternoon and marched to the Head- 
quarters Camp, where General Stopford, the 
General Officer in Temporary Command of the 
8th Army Corps, inspected the men, shook hands 
with all the officers and finally had Corporal 
Groushkousky out to the front, and, after con- 
gratulating him warmly on his gallant action, 
pinned the medal on his breast. 

[209] 



CHAPTER XXII 

THE AUSTRALIANS AND NE^V ZEALANDEBS 

Towards the end of July, owing to the numbers 
killed, wounded and in hospital, the Corps was 
reduced to less than half its strength, and as, at 
that time, we had no depot in Egypt to send us 
recruits, it was obvious that, in the course of an- 
other couple of months, this interesting and useful 
unit would cease to exist, if the present rate of 
casualties continued. The reduced strength of 
the Corps having come to the knowledge of Sir 
Ian Hamilton, I was ordered to proceed to Im- 
bros and report to General Headquarters there. 
I had an interview with the Commander-in-Chief, 
and the result was that I was commissioned to go 
to Alexandria, and, if possible, recruit two fresH 
troops of Israelites in Egypt, and there establish 
a Recruiting and base depot for the Corps. 

A considerable stir had been created through- 
out the Jewish world when it became kno^^Tl that 
there was, for the first time in British history, a 
Jewish unit fighting side by side with British sol- 
diers; and there is no doubt that the sympathy of 

[210] 



AUSTRALIANS, NEW ZEALANDERS 

Jews for the Allies was considerably fostered by 
the presence of this unit fighting in their ranks. 

In proof of this I received letters from Jews, 
and, indeed, from Gentiles, too, from all parts of 
the world, letters which showed a deep interest in, 
and sympathy for, this Jewish fighting unit. 

Perhaps the most prominent Gentile from 
whom I heard was Colonel Roosevelt. I only 
wish I could publish his heartening letter, but at 
least I may mention that he was anxious to know 
if my men made good soldiers, because a relative 
of his was in command of a battery of artillery 
in one of the Southern States, and he had reported 
to the ex-President that, curiously enough, part of 
it was entirely composed of Jews, who were 
among the most efficient soldiers in the whole bat- 
tery. 

During my interview with Sir Ian Hamilton, 
I brought these facts to his knowledge, but I 
found that he was already well informed of the in- 
terest and sympathy which the Zion Mule Corps 
had aroused among the neutral Jews of the world, 
as he himself had received letters from prominent 
Israelites in America, and, among others, one 
from the editor of the New York Jewish news- 
paper. The Day, asking if such a unit really 
existed. 

[211] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Sir Ian Hamilton's reply, which appeared in 
The Day, is as follows: 

General Headquarters, 
Mediterranean Expeditionary Force. 

It may interest j^ou to know that I have here, fight- 
ing under my orders, a purely Jewish unit. As far as 
I know, this is the first time in the Christian era that 
such a thing has happened. 

The men who compose it were cruelly driven out of 
Jerusalem hj the Turks, and arrived in Egypt, with 
their families, absolutely destitute and starving. 

A complete transport Corps was there raised from 
them, for voluntary service with me against the Turks, 
whom they naturally detest. 

These troops were officially described as the *'Zion 
Mule Corps," and the officers and rank and file have 
shown great courage in taking water, supplies and am- 
munition up to the fighting line under heav}' fire. One 
of the private soldiers has been specially recommended 
by me for gallantry and has duly received from the 
King the Distinguished Conduct Medal. 

It will therefore be seen that, in my endeavours 
to keep the Corps alive, I had a powerful ally in 
Sir Ian Hamilton. 

I was the guest of the Headquarters Staff in 
Imbros for a few days, so that I had an oppor- 
tunity of studying its ways at close quarters. 
There was certainly no slacking here. Work 
seemed to go on da)^ and night, and the food and 

[212] 



AUSTRALIANS, NEW ZEALANDERS 

drink were almost spartan in their simplicity, 
practically nothing but the rations which were 
served out to the troojjs, officers and men ahke. 

I have heard some criticism levelled at the Gen- 
eral for being camped away from the Army, on a 
secluded island, but, in my humble opinion, it was 
by far the best position for the Headquarters 
Staff and the Commander-in-Chief, because, ow- 
ing to the unfortunate division of the Mediter- 
ranean Expeditionary Force into two parts, he 
was more in touch, from Imbros, with Anzac and 
Ilelles than he could have been in any other 
place. 

Of course, had the Army been all together, I 
think to be with it would be the right place for 
the Commander-in-Chief. It may suit the tem- 
perament of the Japanese soldier to have his chief 
hidden miles away from the battlefield, but I do 
not think that this plan fits in with the tempera- 
ment of the British soldier. He likes to see his 
General, and he likes to know that his General 
sees him, and realises from personal contact the 
nature of the task he is asking his men to per- 
form. 

While I was at Imbros, I made an expedition 
across the island over hill and dale to the opposite 
shore, and it was curious to see the old-world way 

[213] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

in which the Greeks, who inhabit the island, hve 
in these modern, hustling days. There I saw two 
women grinding at the mill, and the oxen tread- 
ing out the corn, just as they did thousands of 
years ago throughout all the lands of the East. 
I found the people hospitable and kindly, readj^ 
to offer the stranger a cool draught of water from 
a gushing spring (and this was really delicious 
after Gallipoli) , or a jilatter of luscious mulber- 
ries, which w^ere then in season. 

But what, perhaps, interested me beyond all 
else was the view which, on my return journey, I 
obtained from the summit of a hill, of the position 
of the Turkish guns at the back of Achi Baba. 
With my glasses I could see them perfectly 
plainly, and could actually make out the gunners 
as they served the guns. With a powerful tele- 
scope this w^ould have made a most excellent ob- 
servation station, as all the Turkish movements at 
the back of Achi Baba could be plainly seen from 
this Imbros hill. 

When I left Headquarters at Imbros I took 
passage on a trawler w^hich called in at Anzac, 
where the Australian-New Zealand Ai'my Corps 
were dug into the ridges. 

I had, of course, a good view of the position 
they held on the precipitous cliffs and hills which 



AUSTRALIANS, NEW ZEALANDERS 

rose in successive sierra-like ridges from the very 
seashore, and I could then adequately realise the 
tremendous feat they had performed in gaining a 
footing on these heights against such a brave and 
well-armed foe as the Turks. 

I had met the Australians before in March, 
when I had paid them a visit in their romantic 
camping-ground under the shadow of the Pyra- 
mids, and it was in the same month that I met, 
on the verandah of Shepheard's Hotel, in Cairo, 
the chief medical officer to the Australian iVrmy, 
Surgeon-General Williams, whom I had met in 
South Africa and London some fifteen years 
previously. 

Thinking that he would remember me, I sat 
down beside him and opened the conversation by 
saying: "Any chance of a billet with you, Gen- 
eral?" 

He looked rather blankly at me and said: 
"Not a ghost of a chance unless you are an Aus- 
tralian. Who are you anyhow?" 

I then told him who I was, upon which his face 
lit up with welcome, but he would not believe that 
I could be the same man, and asked me to re- 
move my headgear so that he might have a good 
look at me, as he said I had grown ten years 
younger, 

[215] 



WITH TllK ZIONISTS IN r,ALLirOLl 

"How do you manage to keep your youth T' 
lie cieiiianded. 

"Oh," I rephed, ''it is easily done. .Vu un- 
eventful life and no worries." at whieh the Oen- 
cral, knowing something ot' my travels and ail- 
ventures, winked, ordered a eouple of whiskies 
and sodas, and over these we had a long talk about 
things past, present and to eome. 

General Williams took me round the lu\spi- 
tals and kitchens out at 3Iena Camp, where we in- 
spected the tunbulances and i^ther things under 
his eharg'e, and I was much impresseil with the 
completeness with whieh Australia had ei|uipped 
the magnitieent lighting foree whieh she had sent 
to the aid of Kmrland. 

It was a great pleasure to meet Colonel Kyan. 
a senior member of the Australian Medical Staff, 
who had served with the Turks as a surgemi in 
their last war against Russia and was with them 
all through the siege of Plevna. T had read his 
most interesting book describing his experiences 
in that war, and altog^ether I was delighteil to 
have had the pleasure of meeting this most genial 
Irish Australian. 

Camp life at ]Mena, for the thirty odd thousand 
men in training there, was very dull indeed. 
There was not nnich to relieve the monotony once 

[216] 



AUSTJIALJAXS, NKW ZKALAXDKJtS 

IIjc J pyramids fiu(J hecn clirrihcfJ an<J iijc Aiislra- 
Jian colours liarJ fjccri ];]arjt<:(J rjri Uif: sorurrjitK, save 
an extra dose of .san(Jstonri. J I was no wontJer, 
therefore, that every now and again tfie troops 
wo(jld invade Cairo in force anrl paint tJie city 
red; in fact, orjc ruVJit they painted it very red in- 
deed, vvijcn tfiey IjcJd a corrahorce rouncJ the hhi/- 
ing ruins of a Cairene Courtesan's Temple, which 
they hatJ givcrj io tfie flames, hecause the Priestess 
had, in some way or oUjcj-, rrialaciministered the 
rites! 

Tlic Staff of tlie Australian ancJ Xcw ZcalantJ 
Kxpcflitionary J''orce, commanded f>y (jleneral 
IJirdworjd, had their JleafJfpiarters at Shep- 
heard's, and there I met again young Onslow, of 
the Indian Cavalry, the General's A. D. C, and 
one of the nicest and handsomest hoys that ever 
}>uckled on a sahre. He was not only heloved 
of men, hut tfic gods hjvcd him, too, and it was 
a hlack (Jay for me wlien 1 heard fjc was killed 
at Anzac. 

I thouglit ()\' all these things as I approached 
the little landing-stage on the Anzac shore, where, 
as we dropped anchor ckjse to the heach, we got 
vigorously shelled hy the I'urks, whose guns, 
most artf(jlly concealed, dominated the landing. 

In the course of the eight months' sojourn 

[217] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

there, these guns were responsible for the deaths 
of hundreds of tlie Austrahans and New Zealand- 
ers, who were killed while they worked at loading 
and unloading the stores and ammunition, which 
were constantly poured into Anzac. In spite of 
this shell-fii-e, all through the hot weather scores 
of men might be seen swimming about and thor- 
oughly enjoying themselves in the water. A 
look-out man was kept and w^hen he reported a 
shell coming all dived until the explosion was 
over. 

There are many good stories told of the Aus- 
tralians and their want of reverence for the Staff 
and their love for the General. 

On one occasion, while a dignified and very 
portly British Staff Officer, who had been hav- 
ing a swim, was drying himself, an Australian 
came by, and, giving him a hearty smack, said: 
"Hallo, old sport, you look about ready for the 
knife. Have you been getting into the biscuit- 
tin?" 

Whatever the Australians may have lacked in 
what soldiers know as discipline and etiquette 
they more than made up for by their fearlessness 
and utter contempt of death in the fight. The 
ver}^ fact that they had gained a footing on these 
precipitous crags in the face of a desperate re- 

[218] 



AUSTRALIANS, NEW ZEALANDERS 

sistance showed that they were a race of super- 
men. 

In vain did the Turks, time after time, hurl 
themselves at them in an attempt to drive them 
into the sea. The Turks would charge, crying: 
"Allah ! Allah I" The Australians would respond 
by leaping on the parapets of their trenches, 
shouting: "Come on, you blighters, and bring 
him with you." They fear nothing — God, Man, 
Death, or Devil! 

When we eventually plant our flag trium- 
phantly on Gallipoli, the flag of Australia and 
New Zealand must float in the place of honour 
upon the Anzac peaks, for here, in their shadows, 
at peace forever, lie thousands of their bravest 
sons. 

After a few hours my trawler weighed anchor 
and we steamed south for Helles, which we 
reached in a couple of hours. 

The skipper was a north of Ireland man, and 
he told me much about the arduous life which the 
men in the trawlers and mine-sweepers led. Dur- 
ing the first attack upon the Dardanelles some of 
these went through a perfect hell of shell-fire, in 
fact, right through the Narrows. For eight 
months, scores of them were constantly on the 
perilous work of mine-sweeping round Helles and 

[219] 



WITH THE ZIOXISTS IX GALLirOLI 

the islands, or carrying troops to and fro: and all 
this time thev were daily luider iire. or. during 
the night, with all lights out, risking themselves 
and their vessels. ]More than iMie sweeper, with 
all its crew and living freight, came to a sad and 
sudden end through collision in the dark. 

As we neared the landing-stage I spied a new 
kind of warship for the tirst time, and as we 
passed close to her I saw her elevate the muzzles 
o{ the t>\o great guns with which she was armed 
and let tly a hrace of shells at the enemy's batter- 
ies on Asia. This was the coming of the nnsink- 
able ^lonitor, armed with her terrible fourtecn- 
inch guns. I don't know how accurate her shots 
were, but the Turkish gunner who replied was a 
marvel, for, with his third shot, I saw him strike 
the deck of the jNIonitor plump amidships. I 
heard afterwards that this shell went through all 
the decks and stuck in the keel plate. By a 
great piece of good luck no diunage was done, 
as it did not explode. 

When I reached the camp of my Zion men I 
held a parade and told them how interested Sir 
Ian Hamilton was in the Corps, and how he 
wished it to be kept up, and with that view had 
ordered me to proceed to Alexandria to recruit 
two new troops of their co-religionists. I asked 

[220] 



AUSTRALIANS, NEW ZEAL ANDERS 

them a]] to be good boys while I was away, and 
to work as well for Lieutenant Gye, who would 
command them in my absence, as they had al- 
ways worked for me, and in this way keep up 
the reputation of the Zion Corps. 



[221] 



CHArXER XXIII 

VOYAGE TO EGYPT 

To assist ine in recruit ing-, I decided to take with 
ine Claude Kolo, Captain Trumpledor, and Cor- 
poral Groushkousky, D. C. ]M. At 2 p. m. on 
the 2r)th July we steamed away from Cape 
Ilelles in a little trawler and without adventure 
arrived at Lenmos at about 7 p. m. We imme- 
diately went on board the Staff Ship the Aragon 
in order to get a warrant for our passages to 
Alexandi'ia. 

I must say that I was astonished to find such 
a splendid Royal ^lail Line Steamer as the 
Aragon anchored idly in ]Miidros harbour, 
merely to provide quarters for the Lines of Com- 
munication Staff. She must have been costing- 
thousands of pomids per week and might have 
been doing much more useful work on the high 
seas, where there was a shortage of ships of all 
kinds. 

I have no doubt there were many good men 
aboard who would prefer to have roughed it on 
the island in tents, as did the members of Sir Ian 



VOYAGE JO KGYPT 

Ilamilton's Headquarters Staff at Imbros, and 
there was no reason, so far as J know, why they 
should not liave earnped on Lernnos. 

It was twenty-four ijours fjefore we could take 
ship for Alexandria, so, durlnfj; tlje ifjterval, 1 
went to call on a naval oflieer who held an im- 
portant Staff appointment, and who happened 
to he at the momerjt in Mudros harbour. 

I found the same old dilfieulty of getting about 
in the harbour from one ship to another, and it 
was only due to the courtesy of the Captain com- 
rnarjding the Ararjon, who kindly jjlaced his 
boat, cox, and crew at my disjjosal, that I was 
enabled to visit my friend. It was a lovely moon- 
light night as we skimmed across the shimmer- 
ing water and it was not long until I found my- 
self on the quarter deck of the " ." 

My naval friend had j ust finished dinner when 
I got aboard, and was most sympathetic and 
helpful when I told him some of the things which 
were troubling my mind, and which I had spe- 
cially come to lay before him. 1 was anxious to 
get him to use his influence to send more lighters 
and more tugs to assist in the disembarkation of 
stores at Ilelles. The landing officer there, just 
before my dejjai-ture, had begged of me to do 
what I could in this respect with somebody in 

[223] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLirOLI 

authority, as he said he had made repeated req- 
uisitions for more tugs and hgiiters, but all in 
vain. I was anxious, too, because the pier which 
had been built by the sappers was of a very flimsy 
nature, and I knew that the first storm that arose 
would wash the whole thing away, and then, un- 
less there was a good store of provisions, am- 
numition, forage, etc., on shore, it would be a 
ver}' bad look-out for those of us on the Penin- 
sula. As a matter of fact the pier was washed 
away later on, and for some time the horses and 
mules were on half rations, and we ourselves were 
threatened with a shortage of food, but, mainly 
owing to the excellent arrangements made by 
Brigadier-General Coe, the head of the Supply 
and Transport Department, Colonel Striedinger, 
and other members of his efficient Staff, no 
breakdown ever occurred. 

]\Iy naval friend was not over pleased when I 
told him about this shortage of boats and tugs, 
and led me to understand that the Xa\y had 
supplied ever}i:hing Avhich the Aimy had de- 
manded. 

It is of vital importance, when our Army and 
'NsLYY work together, as so often happens, that 
the Staffs of both should pull together. I think 
this could be ensured if a capable naval officer, 

[224] 



VOYAGE TO EGYPT 

having the entire confidence of the Admiral on 
the spot, were attached to the General's Head- 
quarters, and a capable military officer, in whom 
the General placed implicit reliance, were put on 
the Admiral's Staff; these two officers working 
together for the common good would obviate all 
friction. Of course, I am aware that naval and 
mihtary officers are interchanged on the Staff, 
but juniors are not good enough for this; they 
should be senior men who could speak with 
authority, and whose opinions would cany 
weight. 

The position of the island of Lemnos, some 
forty miles southwest of the Dardanelles, makes 
it an important strategic point, more esjjecially 
as it possesses a magnificent harbour which, with 
very little trouble and expense, could be made 
practically impregnable. I sincerely hope that 
we will retain possession of this island for, with 
it as a naval base, the Dardanelles can be bottled 
up at any moment, and the whole of the adjacent 
seas dominated. 

Turkey at present still claims the island. It 
should therefore be annexed by us as some small 
compensation for the Gallipoli failure. 

On the following day at 7 P. m. we got on 
board a transport bound for Australia, via Port 

[225] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Said. I found mj^self the Senior Officer on 
board, and therefore had to take command of the 
troops, and among my other charges were some 
fifty nursing sisters, who had been brought to 
Lemnos direct from England, and were now 
being transferred for duty to the mihtary hos- 
pitals in Egypt. 

Soon after I got aboard we weighed anchor, 
and I then put the ship's adjutant to the task of 
detailing to their boats every individual on the 
ship for whom I was responsible, as I knew there 
were hostile submarines six or seven hours out 
from Lemnos, and I wished to be as ready as 
possible in case of an attack. 

At nine o'clock I got the Captain to sound the 
alarm, when everybody rushed and stood by their 
own particular boat; I then made a minute in- 
spection, looked over the list of names boat by 
boat, and by ten o'clock all knew their proper 
places. 

The night was hot, so laying a blanket on the 
deck, I slept on it there. I was awakened out of 
a deep sleep by a loud explosion. I leaped up 
instantty, not yet quite wide awake, saying to 
myself, what a funny time for an aeroplane to 
drop a bomb. The next instant I realised that 
I was at sea, and it flashed through my mind that 

[226] 



VOYAGE TO EGYPT 

we had been torpedoed. As I looked over the 
side, I saw a shell explode a mile or so away, 
over and beyond a submarine which, in the bright 
moonshine, could just be made out. The re- 
port which had roused me was a shot which had 
been fired from our own 4.7-inch gun fixed on 
the stern of the ship. The vessel was instantly 
swung round so as to present as small a surface 
as possible to the submarine, and we made off as 
fast as the ship could steam. A British war- 
vessel of some kind came up in a few minutes, 
and we saw and heard nothing more of the sub- 
marine, but during the few minutes while the 
alarm lasted, things were pretty lively on board 
our transport, and many of the nurses rushed to 
the side to see what had happened, but there was 
no sign of alarm or panic among them ; they took 
it all as a matter of course, and seemed quite dis- 
appointed when we reached Port Said without 
further adventure. 



[227] 



CHAPTER XXIV 

RECRUITING IN EGYPT 

We were detained one night in Port Said, and 
the following morning made our way by rail to 
Alexandria. It was an interesting journey be- 
cause it took us along the Suez Canal as far as 
Ismalia, where we saw all the defences and the 
troops guarding it, and also the precautions 
taken by the householders along the bank, who 
had turned their homes into little sand-bagged 
forts. It was on this journey that I saw, for the 
first time, the celebrated battlefield of Tel-el- 
Kebir where General Wolseley crushed Arabi 
Pasha and his army, and there the graves of 
British and Egyptian soldiers who fell in the 
battle may be seen from the railway carriages. 
This journey to Alexandria is rather a round- 
about one, for it is necessary to go almost to 
Cairo before reaching the Cairo to Alexandi'ia 
line. However, we eventually reached Alexan- 
dria in the afternoon, and Claude Rolo took me 
to the house of his mother, Mrs. J. Rolo, one of 
the kindest and best ladies it has ever been my 

[228] 



RECRUITING IN EGYPT 

good fortune to meet. Here, in this most com- 
fortable and luxurious house, I was made to feel 
thoroughly at home. While there, I, unfortu- 
nately, had a rather severe attack of fever, but 
thanks to Mrs. Rolo and her nieces, especially 
"the angel Gabrielle," I was soon restored to 
health. 

My first duty was to see General Sir John 
Maxwell at Cairo and get his consent and help 
in raising new recruits for the Zion Mule Corps. 

When I arrived in Cairo, however, in the after- 
noon, I found that I could not see the General 
until the next morning, so I determined to go 
and see a friend in hospital, but in which hospi- 
tal? That was my difficulty. 

As I was standing in the verandah of Shep- 
heard's Hotel, wondering to whom I could apply 
for information, up the steps from the street 
tripped a charming young lady in nurse's cos- 
tume. "The very thing for me," I said to my- 
self, and without more ado I walked up to her 
and explained my difficulty and asked her if she 
could help. She was kindness itself, and took 
a great deal of trouble to put me in touch with 
my friend, and through taking her advice I suc- 
ceeded in my quest. 

I saw Miss again on several occasions in 

[229] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

the hotel, but not being of a forward nature, I 
kept out of her way. General Williams told 
me that she was an Australian lady devoting her- 
self to nursing the sick and womided. I have 
heard since that she has added beauty to the 
British Peerage. 

While I was in Cairo, I visited the Turkish 
wounded in the Red Crescent Hospital there, 
where they were well looked after and seemed 
most comfortable. I met a very interesting- 
young Turkish officer, the son of Djemel Pasha, 
with whom I had a long conversation. He had 
been captured by the Indian Lancers when he 
was reconnoitring for the attack on the Suez 
Canal. He told me that he was the only sur- 
vivor of a party of twelve, and that he himself 
had received fourteen lance wounds. He was 
an extremely good type of Turkish officer, and 
during the short time we were together we be- 
came great friends, and on leaving him he took 
my hand in both his and shook it warmly, saying 
he hoped we would always be good friends no 
matter what the politicians might do for our re- 
spective countries. 

When I saw General JNIaxwell he did every- 
thing necessary to ensure my success in this new 
endeavour to raise recruits; he summoned the 

[230] 



RECRUITING IN EGYPT 

leading Israelitish notables of Cairo to meet me 
in his office, where he put my needs before them, 
and requested them to do what was possible in 
the way of getting suitable men from their com- 
munity. Two members of this committee took 
an interest in raising recruits for the corps, 
Moise Cattaui Pasha and ]\Ir. Jack Mosseri, the 
latter a well-known Zionist and a great Hebrew 
scholar, thoroughly imbued with all the best 
ideals of the Hebrew race. He was a tower of 
strength to me, and organised meetings in vari- 
ous synagogues throughout Cairo. One such 
meeting which took place in the beautiful temple 
in the Mousky I shall never forget. We walked 
through this celebrated and picturesque part of 
Cairo to the meeting — and what a walk! the 
colours, the lights, the sights, and the sounds, 
were all redolent of the very heart of the East; 
even Rahab might be seen there looking out of a 
window ; but of all the charms of the IMousky, and 
it has many, commend me to its smells! There 
you will find the full fragrance of the East in all 
its pristine power and glory ! Threading our way 
carefully through the narrow alley-ways, dexter- 
ously avoiding babies, donkeys, mules and camels, 
we at last reached the Temple. We found it 
packed with people, and on the platform stood 

[231] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

the Grand Rabbi of Cairo, a most imposing and 
eastern-looking personage, and other notables of 
the city. 

Cattaui Pasha and others, whom Mr. JMosseri 
had interested in the movement, made stirring ad- 
dresses to the Jewish youths among the congrega- 
tion. The result of Mr. Mosseri's efforts was 
that, in the course of a few weeks, some one hmi- 
dred and fifty Jewish recruits had been obtained 
from Cairo alone, and these I designated the 
"Cairo Troop" of the Zion ]Mule Corps. 

I am sure that Mr. Jack ^losseri will be glad 
to know that the great majority of these men 
whom he took so much trouble to imbue with the 
old Hebrew fighthig spirit of the heroes of the 
past, proved courageous and useful soldiers, 
when, after a brief training, they found them- 
selves before the enemy in Gallipoli. 

While I was at Alexandria I was unluckj^ 
enough to get my hand crushed under a motor, 
and as it required a great deal of attention, I 
used to go to the Greek Hospital every day be- 
cause it was close to the office where I worked. 
This hospital was full of our sick and wounded, 
where they were carefully attended and nursed 
by an efficient staff of Greek doctors and Greek 
nurses. I used to go round the wards talking to 

[232] 



RECRUITING IN EGYPT 

the men, and they were all perfectly happy and 
contented, expressing gratitude for the care 
lavished on tliem by the Greek ladies of Alexan- 
dria. Dr. Petredes attended to my wounded 
hand, and nobody could have been more kind. 
One of the Greek sisters told me rather a pathetic 
story about an Australian. He was a young fel- 
low badly wounded in the leg; the wound got 
worse and worse, and it was seen that he must 
die. He was told by the clergyman who came 
to visit him that his case was hopeless, but he was 
not in the least bit upset about himself, he only 
grieved at the sorrow it would give his mother. 
Knowing that a photograph would be a comfort 
to her, he asked if a photographer could be 
brought. When the latter had arrived, the brave 
lad insisted on being propped up in bed, and then 
requested the photographer not to snap him until 
he could get a nice smile on his face, "For," he 
said, "I would like my mother to know that I am 
dying quite happy." In a few hours the boy had 
passed away, but there remained a photograph 
with a bright, cheery smile as some small consola- 
tion for the bereaved mother. 



[233] 



CHAPTER XXV 

LIFE IN EGYPT 

While I was in Egypt a few things struck me 
with particular force : one was the inefficiency of 
the Police of Alexandria ; another the appalling 
callousness of the average Egyptian in his treat- 
ment of animals. 

It was an amusing sight in Alexandria to watch 
the police trying to regulate the traffic. The 
di'ivers would take absolutely no notice of the 
policeman's raised hand, and would dash reck- 
lessly over the crossing, quite regardless of what 
might be coming do^Mi the cross street. After 
being flouted in this way, the policeman would 
leave his beat, run after the driver and, on catch- 
ing him up, engage in a wordy warfare for five 
minutes. The same performance would be re- 
peated over and over again as each successive 
Jehu came furiously along at his best pace. 

I also had some experience of the lax methods 
prevailing in the Passport Department — a most 
important office in war-time, especially in a coun- 

[234] 



LIFE IN EGYPT 

try like Egypt, which was simply teeming with 
spies. 

A couple of my men who had been sent from 
Gallipoli to the Base Hospital at Alexandria, 
owing to wounds or illness, wished to resign from 
the Corps and go to America, as they had no de- 
sire to return to the Dardanelles. I, of course, 
could not grant their request, so by some means 
or other (bribery, no doubt) they obtained a false 
passport, got on board ship and gave instructions 
to some friends of theirs to inform me, three days 
after they had left, that they were on their way 
to America and hoped I did not mind ! To make 
sure that these rascals were not merely hiding in 
Alexandria, I carefully investigated the matter 
and found that one, at all events, had really 
sailed. 

I hav6 referred to the cruelty which the average 
Egyptian shows in his treatment of animals. To 
give one glaring example : there is a steep incline 
over the railway bridge near Gibbari, a suburb of 
Alexandria. Over this bridge, the slopes of 
which are paved with smooth stones, rolls a great 
part of the immense traffic which goes to and 
from the docks. Almost at any hour of the day 
one may see half-a-dozen wretched horses hauling 
overladen carts up this slippery slope, being un- 

[235] 



WITH THE ZIOXISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

mercifully beaten by their di'ivers, and falling 
sometimes two or three tunes before they reach 
the summit. I say, without hesitation, that such 
a scandal is a blot on Alexandria, a blot on the 
police officials, who wink at it, and a blot on the 
British rulers in Egypt who tolerate such a state 
of affairs. A couple of thousand pounds should 
be set aside at once to remedy the grievous suffer- 
ings which are dail}^ and hourly inflicted there on 
our unfortunate dumb friends. 

I was told that a Society for the Prevention of 
Cruelty to Animals flourishes in the country. If 
a member of it ever goes up and do'SMi the Gib- 
bari Bridge, he must surely turn a blind eye on 
the cruel sights which are to be seen there almost 
at any time, othenvise he must be shamed for- 
ever. This recalls to my mind a story which Gye 
once told me about a leading light of this Society 
who was on a visit to Egypt. He made a tour 
of the Provinces, and at each place he visited he 
was delighted to find that the officials were most 
zealous supporters of the Society. As a proof 
of their keenness for the League, they would con- 
duct him to the pubhc pound and show him num- 
bers of maimed camels, horses and donkeys which 
they assured him was the day's catch. Of com'se 
it was all eyew^ash, as the wily officials had got 

[236] 



LIFE IN EGYPT 

news of the coming of the great one, and told 
the police to lock up the wretched animals for 
just as long as he was in the place and no 
longer. 

While the Arabs show appalling callousness to 
the sufferings of animals, they often exhibit in- 
tense kindness and affection for each other ; more 
especially does the Arab mother show great love 
for her child. A pretty story has come down to 
us illustrating this maternal solicitude. An 
Arab youth married a maiden whom he came to 
love passionately, but he had great love for his 
mother too, and of this the wife was intensely 
jealous, so much so, that she told him one day that 
she could never love him fully while his mother 
lived, and that the only way for him to secure her 
affections was to kill his mother and bring her 
heart as a peace-offering. The wretched youth, 
blinded by passion, committed this terrible crime, 
and, concealing his mother's heart within his 
gown, he ran swiftly to present it to his wife. 
On the way he tripped and fell heavily, and, in 
doing so, the heart fell to the ground. On pick- 
ing it up to replace it, the heart said to him, "My 
poor boy, I hope you did not hurt yourself when 
you fell." 

I related this story to a friend in London, and 

[237] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

he said: "Now I will tell you a story of filial 
piet}^ on the part of an English boy. He pos- 
sessed a dog of which he Avas passionately fond, 
named Paddy. One day a cart ran over Paddy 
in the street, and he was picked up dead. The 
boy's mother broke the dreadful news to her little 
son while he was having dinner, saying how 
sorrj'^ she was to have to tell him that poor Paddy 
was killed. The boy was not very much con- 
cerned, and went on eating his pudding. Later 
on, however, in the nursery his Nana condoled 
with him on the loss of his pet, whereupon he 
raised a tremendous outcry, sobbing and weeping 
bitterly. His mother rushed up to see what was 
the matter, and on finding he was weeping for 
the dog, said, 'But, darling, I told you at dinner- 
time that Padd}^ was killed, and you didn't seem 
to mind much.' 

" 'Oh, mammy,' he sobbed, 'I thought you said 
Daddy— not Paddy.' " 

Thinking this would be a good story to tell a 
little boy that I know very well, I related it to 
him, but as he took it very gravely, I asked him 
whether he saw the joke, and he said, "No." 
Now he possessed a black kitten, named "Mike," 
for which he had a great affection, so I thought 
I could illustrate my story by saying: "Well, 

[238] 



LIFE IN EGYPT 

now tell me which would you rather see run over 
and killed— Mike or Daddy?" 

Having given long and serious consideration 
to this problem, and with a troubled look on his 
little face, he, after a great inward struggle, at 
last said: "I think Mike." 

During the time I was in Alexandria an at- 
tempt was made there on the life of the Sultan of 
Egy^pt, not the first attempt, by any means. 
Now the Sultan is a kindly, good-natm'ed ruler, 
having the welfare of Egj^pt and the Egyptians 
thoroughly at heart ; there is nothing whatever of 
the tyrant about him, and therefore there is no 
excuse for attempting his life. I happen to know 
that the Sultan was not at all anxious to accept 
the dignity which was thrust upon him, but since 
he has fallen in with the policy of England, it is 
the duty of England to protect him and uphold 
him by every means in her power. Let it be 
known that in case of any further attempt stern 
measures will be taken, not only on the perpetra- 
tor of the crime, or the attempted crime, but on 
the family and relatives of the criminal, and also 
on the leading members of any political society 
to which he belonged — because, of course, they 
are all in league with each other and know per- 
fectly well what is going on — and if they knew 

[239] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

that they would be pimished as well as the crimi- 
nal they would take good care either to dissuade 
him from the crime or give timely warning to the 
authorities. If they fail to do this, their property 
should be confiscated to the State, and if the crime 
were perpetrated from a hired house, then the 
o^vner of tlie house, who had led it, should be se- 
verely punished, because in Egypt the only pohcy 
that is miderstood by the criminal agitator is two 
eyes for one eye, and a whole row of teeth for one 
tooth; and the sooner our pusillanimous politi- 
cians reahse this the better it will be for Egj^pt, 
the Egyptians, and the continuance of our rule 
there. As ex-President Roosevelt said in his 
vigorous and memorable speech at the Guildhall, 
we should either "govern Egypt or get out." It 
is impossible to govern such a country on the 
milk-and-water policy so loved by invertebrate 
politicians. 

I was privileged, while at Alexandria, to meet 
on many occasions Prince Fuad, the brother of 
the Sultan, and it was at one of his many inter- 
esting and hospitable receptions, for which he is 
famous, that I had the opportunitj'- of being pre- 
sented to His Highness the Sultan. When, how- 
ever, I looked through the windows of the room 
where the Sultan was receiving, I saw that he did 

[240] 



LIFE IN EGYPT 

not appear to be very well (it was soon after the 
attempt had been made on his life), and there 
was such a throng waiting to be presented that I 
determined that I, at least, would save him the 
fatigue of a handshake. There were compensa- 
tions for my solicitude for the Sultan, because at 
that very moment I was talking to a most charm- 
ing and interesting lady, whose people had hailed 
from the famous city of the Caliphs, Baghdad, 
and although her ancestors came from that dusky 
neighbourhood, she herself was fair as a lily, had 
gloriously red hau*, and was withal as entertain- 
ing as Scheherazade. At this same entertain- 
ment I saw standing before my eyes and talking 
to the Sultan a lady whom I took to be Cleo- 
patra herself retui*ned to life. I was amazed to 
see some one really alive so like the picture of 
the famous Queen of Egypt, and yet there she 
was within a few feet of me, carrying on an ani- 
mated conversation with the Sultan. I came to 
know "Cleopatra" and her husband very well in- 
deed during my stay in Egypt, and I spent many 
an enjoyable evening under their hospitable roof. 
And what a delightful couple they were ! I shall 
never forget a little impromptu concert which 
took place one night as we sat out under the 
rustling palms in the soft moonlight. Cleo- 

[241] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

patra's husband melted all our hearts by singing, 
in his low, sweet voice, "Un peu d'amour." It 
prompted me to make the ungallant remark to 
Cleopatra that I really did not know which of 
them I liked the better, and ever afterwards she 
whimsically pretended to be hurt at the lack of 
discernment which I had shown. 

Now, Cleopatra, before I bid you good-bye, I 
will only say that I am glad you did not live in 
the days of the Pharaohs, because if you had, I 
am sure you would have been given to the croco- 
diles, for you must Imow that once a year, in those 
barbarous, far-off times, there was chosen for 
that sacrifice the most lovely and the most per- 
fect maiden in all Egj'^pt. 

It was at some reception or other in Egypt 
that I met, about this time, an officer who had 
been on the Staff of the 29th Division in Gal- 
lipoli. Riding about the Peninsula as we both 
did, we met practically every day during two or 
three months, and although we rode together and 
were quite good friends, I never knew what his 
name was, and I never tried to find out, as I am 
not of an inquisitive nature. However, one day 
he disappeared and his place in Gallipoli knew 
him no more. I thought it was very likely he had 
been killed, because his duties often took him into 

[242] 



LIFE IN EGYPT 

perilous places — indeed, any and every place in 
Gallipoli was perilous in those days. At all 
events, here I met him safe and sound, on which 
I heartily congratulated him. A little later he 
asked to be introduced to a friend of mine who 
was also at the reception, so I was compelled to 
confess that I had not the foggiest notion as to 

his name. "My name is B ," he replied ; and 

on asking him if he was any relation of , 

mentioning a well-known public man in Eng- 
land, with whom a few days before I left home 
I had been walking up and down Rotten Row, 
"Oh, yes," said he; "that's my father!" 

My Gallipoli friend was, unfortunately, on the 
Persia when she was sunk without warning in 
the JNIediterranean, and went down with the ship ; 
but his time was not yet, for he luckily came up 
again, and was numbered with the saved, for 
which Allah be praised. 

I hope the reader will not run away with the 
idea that I spent my time in Egypt in a round of 
festivities and riotous living. It was, as a mat- 
ter of fact, very much the reverse, because even 
when I went to these receptions I combined busi- 
ness with pleasure by getting the people I met 
there to help me to get recruits and to interest 
themselves in the Zion ^lule Corps. 

[243] 



CHAPTER XXVI 

KETUKX TO ewU.l.ll\n.l 

I WAS very impatient to gvt baek to Callipoli and 
made several applications to the StatV both by 
letter iuid by telegram to do so, but it takes a 
long time for the machine to move! ^Vt last 1 
receiveti the anxiously looked tor orders for my- 
self and my new men to embark. 

I had a little trouble with a member of tlie 
Stati' before 1 left. mid. as it illustrates the petti- 
ness of some men even when great events are at 
stake, I think it is wortii i-ecounting. I had sent 
him my embarkation return, showing tlie numWr 
of officers imd other ranks lK>uud for the Darda- 
nelles. In the meantime a telegram arrived fivm 
Gallipoli asking for two of my otheers to be sent 
there iimnediately. 1 had tliem on boanl and 
on tlieir way to the front within foiu- hours of the 
time I read the message. Two days afterwards 
when I came to embtu-k, I had with mo my men 
and one other othcer, but the red-tape, red-tabbed 
acting Statf man objected to this otHcer going, as 
he said my original application was for three oH- 



RETURN TO GALLIPOLI 

ficers only, and of these, he said, "Two have 
ah'eady gone; you make the third, therefore the 
other officer cannot go ; he must he left hehind to 
look after the men at Wardian Camp." It was 
in vain that I pointed out to him that this officer 
would he of little use at Wardian, hut that he 
was invaluahle to me, as he knew the various 
languages of the men, which I did not, and that 
I could not very well get on without him. He 
was obdurate, so I said that, as I must have the 
officer with me, I would, if necessary, go and see 
the General and get his sanction. On hearing 
this threat he took counsel with another red-tab 
man, whose official designation entitled him to 
write half the letters of the alphabet after his 
name, and who, from the little I saw of him, was, 
I consider, fully entitled to three or four more! 
These two tin gods, having privily consulted to- 
gether, issued a ukase to the effect that it would 
be impossible to allow the officer to accompany 
me to Gallipoli. "All right, then," I said; 
"there is nothing for it but to see the General, 
as I must have this officer." This meant that I 
had to motor some three miles and lose a lot of 
precious time in order to outwit these ruddy ob- 
structionists, a thing I was determined to do at 
all costs. When I got to the General's office, I 

[245] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX CtALLIPOLI 

tirst interviewed his Staff Officer. ]Major Ains- 
worth. one of the most sensible and helpful statt' 
officers it has been my luck to come across during 
the whole campaign. On my proceeding to tell 
him what I wanted, he said: "Oh. I know all 

about it. ^lajor has already telephoned to 

me that you were on the way, and has said that, in 
his opinion, you should not be allowed to embark 
your extra officer." I remarked to Major Ahis- 
worth that it appeared to me that some of the 
Start' were only there to obstruct, and I repeated 
that this man was necessary to me for the effi- 
ciency of my Corps, and that it was much more 
to the point to have efficient officers in Gallipoli. 
rather than to leave them behind kicking their 
heels hi idleness in Alexandria. This had the 
desired effect on a sensible man like Major Ains- 

worth, who tactfully told Major that I must 

have the officer with me that I wanted : and so the 
incident was closed. 

On embarking for Gallipoh for the second 
time I found that I had 1,100 men on board, made 
up of 102 different miits, many of them without 
officers, and as I was again the senior on boiU'd, 
I had to take conmiand of the whole, and jolly 
glad was I to know that I would only be respon- 
sible for such a heterogeneous collection for two 



RETURN TO GALLirOLI 

or three days. The first thing* that I discovered 
on going ahoard was that for the 1,100 men we 
had only boat accommodation for 700 in the event 
of the ship being sunk. I asked the skipper if 
he usually put to sea in war-time, when sub- 
marines were about, with an inadequate supply 
of boats, and I refused to sign the clearing papers 
to say that I was satisfied with all the arrange- 
ments on board ship. The captain fully agreed 
with me ; he anchored the vessel in the outer har- 
bour, and we went back together next morning 
and interviewed the naval authorities, who were 
furious at the delay in sailing and at my demand 
for more boats, but at the same time promised to 
send them out to us in the course of an hour or 
two, and as soon as they arrived and were stowed 
away on the deck, we sailed for Lenmos. 

I am very thankful that we dodged the sub- 
marines on the way, because with such an over- 
crowded vessel, with so many different units, most 
of them without officers, and hardly standing 
room for everybody, and with verj^ inadequate 
means of getting boats out, I fear that there 
would not have been many survivors had the ves- 
sel been sunk. I issued orders to all on board 
never to part with their life belts, as they would 
have to depend on them principally, and not on 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

the boats, for their hvos. Wo were hieky to es- 
cape, for just about this time the transport 
Famadiifi was sunk with lieavy loss of hfe. It 
passes my eomprehension that ship-owners shouki 
be aUowed to conthiue the antiquated methods 
of Ixiat knvering whieh are still in existence. 
How many hundreds of lives have been lost 
owing to the stupid method in use! Kopes, 
blocks and tackle are fixed to the bow and stern 
of each boat, and to ensure that it should reach 
the sea on an even keel the men using both sets of 
tackle must lower away at exactly the same rate. 
What actually happens in any time of excitement 
is that one rope is lowered much more quickly 
than the other, with the result that the mifortu- 
nate occupants are tilted into the sea and 
drowned. It would be a simple matter to lower 
boats by means of one rope only, and this method 
should be made compulsory on all ship-o^^^le^s. 

Captain Williams of tlie 3Iunsters was my 
ship's adjutant. I beheve he was the only sur- 
viving officer who had huuled fwm the Kivcr 
Ch/dc on that memorable morning of the '2'Ah 
of April; he had gone through that desperate 
tight, and had been engaged in every battle on the 
Peninsula since that date, and yet had come 
tlu-ough it all miscathed. He must have borne 

[■2iS] 



RETURN TO GALLIPOLI 

a charmed life, and 1 sincerely hope liis luck will 
stick to him to the end. lie practically did all 
the work of the ship for me, and I never had a 
more efficient adjutant. 

We readied Lemnos in safety, and got into 
the harhour at dusk, just before the entrance was 
blocked up, because, of course, the harbour mouth 
was sealed every night from dark to dawn, owing 
to the fear of submarines. We lay at anchor all 
night and most part of the next day, and, as no- 
body seemed to take the slightest notice of our 
arrival, the captain and I sailed across the har- 
bour in a tiny boat, although the sea was far from 
calm, and, on reaching the Aragon, I reported 
myself to a gentleman in an eye-glass, whom I 
had never seen before and never want to see 
again. He was very "haw haw," and said that 
I had no business to leave my ship until the mili- 
tary landing officer had been aboard. I re- 
marked that we had been waiting in the harbour 
so long that I thought perhaps the military land- 
ing officer was dead, and so I had come myself to 
report our arrival. With that I left him and re- 
turned to the ship, and soon afterwards we were 
boarded by the landing officers, and the 1,100 
men were drafted off to their different units, I 
going with mine on a trawler to Cape Helles. 

[249] 



WITH THE ZIOXISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

"We arrived at Lancashire Landing on a beauti- 
ful calni moonlight night, and were received with 
joyous shouts of "Shalom" (the Hebrew form 
of salutation "^ from the veterans of the Corps. 

I missed the face of Lieutenant Gorodisky 
from among those who greeted me, for, alas, he 
liad died during my absence from an ilhiess con- 
tracted owing to the hardsliips of the campaign. 
By his death the Corps suffered a severe loss. 
He had resigned from an important and lucra- 
tive post in Alexandria and enlisted as a private 
soldier in the Zion ^lule Corps. His abihty and 
soldierly qualities soon raised hmi to officer's 
rank, and he was one of tlie best and most use- 
ful in the Corps. Like all Israelites he was pas- 
sionately fond of music, and it was he who wrote 
out for me the Hatikvoh, the music of which has 
been arranged for me by ^liss Eva Lonsdale 
and will be found in the Appendix. He told 
me once that, though the Germans claimed 
that they were the most nuisical nation in the 
world, yet all their best musicians were either 
Jews or had Jewish blood in them. His death 
was a sad blow to his widowed mother, as he was 
her only cliild. Madame Gorodisky may. how- 
ever, be proud to have been the mother of such 
a noble character, and it will, I trust, be some 

[-30] 



RETURN TO GALLIPOLI 

consolation to her to know that he was held in the 
highest esteem by every officer and man, not only 
in the Zion Mule Corps but also by those who 
knew him in the French and British regiments 
among whom we were camped. 



[251] 



CHArTEK XXVII 

I irX^UNP. on niy return in September, that life 
on the Peninsula was much less strenuous than 
when I had left for Eg>'pt at the end of July. 
The Turks must have Kvn very short of iunminn- 
tion, for few shells were tired for the tirst tiN e or 
six weeks after our arrival. I was able to have 
drills and parades in the open, exposed to the 
full view of Aohi Baba and Krithia — a thing 
which would have been out of the question in the 
early days. It was quite a pleasure to be able 
to ride about all over the Feninsula even to within 
a few lumdred yards of the Turkish trenches 
without being shelled. Of cinirse, in the days 
when tlie Turks had plenty o{ amnuuiition. they 
thought nothing of wasting half a dozen rounds 
on a soUtary horseman, and nuuiy a time have 1 
had to gallop at breakneck speed to avoid the 
shrapnel which they peppered me with on many 
cxvasions. I was very glad indeed that shells 
were rather scarce, as it gave my recruits time to 



beel;5ebub 

get into sliiipc and get used to the conditions of 
warfare. 

The new Cairo men took to the life very 
kindly, and soon burrowed themselves well into 
the ground and ada])ted themselves to cave 
dwelling as to the manner born. 

In the evenings, when our day's toil was ended, 
we had concerts round our camp fires and en- 
joyed ourselves as much as it was possible to do 
under the circumstances ; in fact, at times we used 
to forget that we were at war. 

The camp-fire sing-songs were rather weird af- 
fairs — songs in l^'.nglish (Tipperary, for choice), 
French, Kussian, Hebrew and Arabic — the two 
latter made rather melancholy by the plaintive 
wail of the East. Some of the men were first- 
rate Russian dancers and expert wrestlers, so we 
had many excellent little side-shows. 

The concerts were alwa3^s ended by singing 
*'God Save the King," the JNIarseillaise (for many 
French soldiers would be present), the Russian 
Anthem, and last of all the Maccabjtan JNIarch. 

We had many visitors to our quaint polyglot 
lines; a strenuous lieutenant all the way from 
Canada often called on us, and I was indebted to 
him for an invitation to come and try my hand 
at tent-pegging on a beautiful tan track which he 

[253] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

had made and at which various officers used to 
meet to rim a course. 

Xow I used to be rather good at the game, and 
I think I rather surprised my Canadian friend, 
IMaurice, when, in answer to his bantering chal- 
lenge: "Xow, Colonel, show us how it's done!" 
I took every peg for which I tried. It was good 
to lind that one could still ride straight and de- 
pend on eye, hand and arm, and that the spear- 
point could be made to strike the peg as squarely 
and as surely as of old. 

There was not a great deal of work to be done 
in these days, as there was now any amoimt of 
other Transport which took much of the weight 
off our shoulders. 

The lack of steady hard work made the mules 
very frisky, and some of them were regular de- 
mons. We had one which was rightly named 
Beelzebub, for he was indeed a prince of devils, 
and I veritably believe he made all the other 
mules laugh when he kicked one or other of the 
N". C. O.'s or men. He had an extraordinary 
cat-like faculty of being able to plant fore and 
hind feet into one's ribs practically simultane- 
ously, while at the same moment he would make 
a grab at one's head, emitting all the while 
strange noises and terrifying squeals! He 

[25i] 



BEELZEBUB 

pinned me in a corner one day, apparently to the 
delight of the other mules, and I was glad to get 
out of it alive ! In order to make hmi pay a little 
more respect to his commanding officer for the 
future, I ordered him to be tied up to a tree and 
kept for a day without food or water. This, 
however, did not fall in with Beelzebub's theory 
of things, so he gnawed through the rope in the 
night and then made for the forage stack, where, 
to make up for lost time, he ate about six mule 
rations I — at which the other mules did not laugh I 
No one was over-particular about Beelzebub's 
safety, as he was not what might be called popu- 
lar, so instead of being put do^vn with the others 
in a dug-out, where indeed he would have kicked 
them to bits, he was generally left by himself in 
about the most exposed position that could be 
found for him in the camp, and I am quite cer- 
tain that both Jewish and Gentile prayers went 
up for his speedy annihilation by a Turkish shell ; 
but Beelzebub bore a charmed hfe. Shells 
hopped all round him, cut in tw^o great trees 
which sheltered him, excavated enormous caverns 
at his very heels, but the only effect they had on 
Beelzebub was to rouse his ire and start him off 
on a fresh kicking bout. At last a chunk of shell 
hit the ground close to him, bounced up and 

[255] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

"ricked" off his ribs, making a wound, not veiy 
serious, it is true, but still not exactly calculated 
to improve his diabolical temper. 

I sent liim off to the sick lines to have his 
wound di'essed. Xow I never could find out 
what he actually did to the veterinary surgeon 
who tried to doctor him there, but this officer 
wrote a polite httle note requesting me to be so 
very kind as to remember in futm'e that his hospi- 
tal was for sick mules — not for 3Ian-Eatersl 

I have already mentioned that on the night of 
my return to Galhpoh from Egypt a brilliant 
moon was shining, and by the light of it I saw 
great mounds of earthworks thrown up just to 
one side of om* lines. On looking closer, I fomid 
that these were the emplacements for four hea^'y 
French guns of 9.6-inch calibre. 

I cannot say that I was over-pleased at the 
sight, because I knew that the moment they 
opened fire theii* position would be seen from 
Achi Baba, and the shells which the Tm-ks would 
be bound to hurl at them would be more than 
likely to miss the battery and hit my men and my 
mules. 

Two French officers were in charge of the 
siege pieces. Captain Cujol and Lieutenant La 

[256] 



BEELZEBUB 

Riviere, both exceedingly nice men with whom 
we made great friends. The gallant captain 
was a great horseman, and I often delighted him 
(for he had no horse with him) by mounting him 
on one of mine, and together riding over the 
Peninsula. Lieutenant La Riviere, who was a 
much-travelled man, often entertained us with 
stories of his wanderings and adventures in 
Arabia, Abyssinia and the Soudan in the long 
evenings after we had all dined together in our 
cosy little dug-out. 

While I was away recruiting in Egypt the 
glamom* of the Horse Artillery had fallen upon 
Gye, and, furthermore, Davidson and other offi- 
cers of L Battery had beguiled him, so that soon 
after my return he asked me if I would let him 
go to the Gunners. I was glad to recommend 
him for the transfer, for I felt that with his sound 
common sense and good horsemastership he 
would be of more use to the general cause as a 
gunner than as a muleteer. 

I had two British officers still left with me, 
and here, too, was a case of good material being 
wasted on work which could have been equally 
well done by less brainy men. 

Claude Rolo was an eminent civil engineer, 
and had constructed some of the most important 

[257] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

public buildings in Egypt, and, of course, his 
proper place would have been with the Sappers. 
His brother, I. Rolo, with his vast business ex- 
perience in Egypt, should have been employed 
as purchasing agent for the Army, where his 
knowledge of local affairs would undoubtedly 
have saved us tens of thousands of pounds. His 
talents were wasted merely keeping the records 
of the Zion ^lule Corps Depot at Alexandria. 
I reconmiended both for transfer, but I fear 
their services are still being wasted. 

I wonder when we will wake up to the fact that 
we have plenty of talent if only those in author- 
ity would avail themselves of it and use it in the 
right way. 



[258] 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

A FEAT IN GUNNERY 

By this time, after many weeks and months of 
delving, the efforts of our Engineers and other 
troops to alter the geographical features of the 
Peninsula began to have effect. Long lines of 
communication trenches were dug to and fro 
everywhere. Indeed, the amount of earthwork 
that was excavated in digging trenches and dug- 
outs, both at Helles and Anzac, was simply 
"colossal." If the same amount of digging, 
trenching and dug-outing had been concentrated 
into one effort, it would have been possible to 
make a canal across the narrowest part of the 
Peninsula, wide enough and deep enough for the 
Queen Elizabeth and the rest of the British Fleet 
to sail through, without let or hindrance, to Con- 
stantinople ! 

One good thing the diggers did was to make 
the communication trenches wide and deep 
enough to give ample cover to horses and mules. 
In consequence of this, it was now possible to 
take ammunition and supplies to the front dur- 

[259] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

ing daylight, and so most of our night work 
ceased. Small detacliments of men and mules 
were attached to various battahons for transport 
work, and all over the Peninsula Zion men could 
be met cantering along on their mules — for they 
were good horsemen — and they invariably rode 
when they had a chance. They looked very 
comical as they galloped along, uttering exulting 
yells, their faces grimy, caps crammed home on 
the back of their heads, jacketless and with torn 
shirts, perched up on the pack saddles, the chains 
of which clattered loudly at each stride of the 
mule. Our soldiers, with their usual happy 
knack for nicknames, christened them the "Allies 
Cavahy," while a brilliant wit went even one bet- 
ter and dubbed them "Ally Sloper's Cavalry!" 

While the men were out on these detached 
posts, I, of course, visited them at regular inter- 
vals to see that they were keeping up the reputa- 
tion of the Corps and also to hear any reports or 
complaints they might have to make. It was 
rarely that a day went b}^ without something 
odd or amusing, or both, happening at one or 
other of these detached posts. For example : I 
had some men stationed up the Gully Ravine, 
and just before I visited them the Turks had 
given them a vigorous bombardment which had 

[560] 



A FEAT IN GUNNERY 

set fire to the forage which was stored close by 
the mules. The last of it was being burned up 
just as I arrived on the scene and, as my men 
were still lying low in their dug-out, I shouted 
for the corporal and angrily demanded why they 
had not saved the forage. He replied: "Turk 
he fire shells, plenty shells, hot, hot — too bloody 
hot," which showed that their sojourn with the 
British Army, if it was doing nothing else, was 
at least improving their knowledge of classical 
Enghsh ! 

Although Gye had by this time joined L Bat- 
tery for duty, he still lived with me in our little 
dug-out under the great olive tree, which, by the 
way, now supplied us with excellent olives. Be- 
ing with the gunners, he would occasionally get 
early news of an artillery "strafe," which, as a 
rule, we went together to watch from some com- 
manding position. 

I was not surprised, therefore, when one after- 
noon he came in from the battery and told me 
there was to be a most interesting "shoot" on in 
the afternoon, nothing less than the "strafing" 
of a troublesome Turkish redoubt by the huge 
guns of one of the Monitors. As this promised 
to be a rare good show, we sallied forth on our 
horses, taking the road by X Beach and the 

[2611 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Gully Ravine. On reaching our observation 
post and seeing no sign of a Monitor in the vicin- 
ity, I remarked to Gye: "It certainly is a very 
fine afternoon for a ride, but I don't see much 
appearance of that 'strafe' you promised to show 
me. 

"I think it will be all right," replied Gye, 
"there is the Monitor away out at sea," pointing 
to a speck close over to the Imbros shore, some 
seven or eight miles away — a mere cockleshell in 
the distance. 

On looking from the speck to the redoubt I 
said; "It is not a 'strafe' you have brought me 
out to see but a miracle," because it looked to me 
that it would be little short of a miracle to hit 
that small redoubt which, of course, could only 
be faintly seen from the tops of the Monitor by 
telescope. 

However, I hadn't to wait long for the won- 
derful sight. Punctually to the moment when it 
was expected, we saw the Monitor enveloped in 
great billows of waving clouds of flame and 
smoke — one of her great 14-inch guns had been 
fired. Anxiously we watched the redoubt and, 
incredible as it may seem, the shell only failed to 
strike it by thirty yards, for at that distance from 
it a great upheaval of earth could be seen. 

[262] 



A FEAT IN GUNNERY 

Again we watched the Monitor. "Pouf !" went 
her second gun, this time sending the shell plump 
into the redoubt. The result was extraordinary. 
Up went Turks, rocks, timbers, guns, all mixed 
up in a cloud of smoke, flame and earth — a mar- 
vellous shot ! Three more followed in quick suc- 
cession, each one plumping right into the re- 
doubt, pulverising it absolutely out of existence. 
It was as if a steam-roller had gone over the 
earthworks. A few more shells were dropped 
into the fort, just to make sure, and one of these, 
having struck some hard substance, "ricked" 
across the Peninsula, over the Dardanelles, and 
exploded in Asia! 

I took off my hat to the man behind the gun 
on that Monitor. If he is a type of all other 
gunners in the British Navy, the Germans may 
as well scrap their fleet without further ado. 

After watching this wonderful feat of gun- 
nery, we were riding back towards camp, when 
we saw running towards us an old soldier of a 
Scottish regiment in a state of great excitement, 
apparently having something of importance to 
impart. I pulled up my horse and asked him 
what was the matter. He told me in the broad- 
est Scotch that there was a German spy a little 
further down among the gorse taking notes and 

[263] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IX GALLIPOLI 

sketching the position of a hea^y battery which 
was in position close by the sea. I asked the 
Scotty how he knew the man was a spy, and he 
said: "He's goin' on verra suspeecious." 

I got him to point out the exact position of the 
supposed spy and then I arranged with Gye 
that I would go up and open conversation casu- 
ally with him, and that if I made a certain signal, 
he was to gallop off for an escort. I found the 
"spy" di-essed in kliaki in the miiform of a Scot- 
tish regiment. I opened the conversation by 
asking if he had seen the magnificent shooting of 
the ISIonitor, and carried it on until I found out 
who he was and from whence he had come. I 
knew that his regiment was forward in the 
trenches, so I asked him wh}^ he was not at the 
front, and he told me that he was going through 
a course at the bombing school and so, for the 
moment, was away from his battalion. He 
seemed all right, but to make sure I sent Gye 
over to see the Instructor at the bombmg school, 
which was close by, to find out if such an officer 
was really there taking a course. 

While Gye was away I strolled to the edge of 
the cliff with the supposed spy who, I was now 
pretty sure, was what he represented himself to 
be — a British officer. Down below us on the 

[264] 



A FEAT IN GUNNERY 

shore was the body of a dead horse, half in and 
half out of the sea, and tearing at it was a good- 
sized shark which we could see very plainly, for 
the water was beautifully clear. My spy got 
very keen on seeing this and, borrowing a rifle 
from a soldier standing near, he made such good 
shooting at the shark that it speedily gave up its 
horse-feast and plunged off to the depths in 
terrified haste. In the midst of the fusillade, 
Gye came back to say all was well, so bidding 
my ".py" good-afternoon, we rode off to our 
camp. 

There is no doubt, however, that the Peninsula 
was alive with spies, and at night, on returning 
from the trenches, when all the camps would be 
in slumber, I have repeatedly seen flashes sent up 
from the British lines towards Krithia, where 
they would be answered, but although I tried on 
several occasions to locate the signaller, I never 
succeeded in doing so. Of course I reported the 
matter to Headquarters, but whether they were 
more successful than myself I never learned. 

On one occasion, a night or two before we made 
a big attack, I distinctly saw signals flashed from 
the neighbourhood of the cliffs by the Gully 
Ravine, where there was the Headquarters of a 
Division, to the lines of the Royal Naval Divi- 

[265] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

sion, from which a signaller answered back ; both 
then signalled to somebody on the hill where the 
Headquarters Staff of om' Army Corps were 
established, and this signaller in his turn flashed 
messages up to Krithia, where there was a steady 
red light shown for a considerable time while 
the signalling was m progress. I tried to locate 
the signaller on the Headquarters hill, but failed. 
I then reported the matter to the Chief Signal- 
ling Officer, who told me that whatever hghts I 
had seen were not made by our people, as none 
of the signallers were out on duty that night. 
Gye and I found the spot from which the daring 
spy on the Headquarters hill had been signalling. 
It was most craftily selected, as it was completely 
sheltered for three-quarters of the wa}'^ round, 
and his light could only be seen from the direc- 
tion of Krithia; I had not been able to observe 
it until I came into a direct line between Krithia 
and the hill. 

The tricks and daring of the spy are wonder- 
ful! It was common gossip in the Peninsula 
that a Greek contractor who was allowed to sell 
some tinned foods, etc., to the soldiers, had in 
some of the larger tins, not eatables, but carrier 
pigeons, which he would send off to the Turks 
on suitable occasions, but whether this is true or 

[266] 



A FEAT IN GUNNERY 

not I cannot say for certain. It was rumoured 
that he was found out and shot. 

Some of our fellows used to do the most 
extraordinary things. A sergeant, thoroughly 
bored with life in the trenches, thought he would 
like to break the monotony by having a look at the 
Turks, so, shouldering his rifle, he sauntered over 
to the enemy trenches and looked in, and there 
saw five Turks, tlii'ee sitting together smoking 
and two others lying down having a rest. He 
shot all five and then doubled back to his own 
trench, escaping in some marvellous way the hail 
of bullets that came after him. 

Then there was Lieutenant O'Hara of the 
Dublins, who was always doing some daring feat 
and showing his contempt of death and the Turks 
on every conceivable occasion. He won the 
D. S. O. before going to Suvla, where, alas! his 
luck deserted him, and he was mortally wounded. 
O'Hara fii-mly believed that no Turk could ever 
kill him, for he thought nothing of sitting up on 
the parapet coolly smoking a cigarette, while 
bullets rained all round him. When he had fin- 
ished his survey of the Turkish line he would 
get down, but not before. 

Another brave man of the Dublins was Ser- 
geant Cooke. If ever there was a dangerous 

[267] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

job he always volunteered for it, and was con- 
stantly out reconnoitring the enemy's position 
and bringing in useful information to his officers. 
He, too, was very lucky for a long time ; he was 
one of the few who escaped all hurt in the original 
landing, but at Suvla, Sergeant Cooke, while do- 
ing a brave deed, was mortally wounded, and, 
although he must have been in great agony for 
a couple of hours before he died, he never uttered 
a groan. Just before the last, he said: "Am I 
dying like a British soldier?" No soldier ever 
died more gamely. 



[268] 



CHAPTER XXIX 

THE FINDING OF THE SHIELD OF DAVID 

Soon after the Bulgarians had thrown in their 
lot against us, the Turks, who up to this time had 
been husbanding their ammunition, felt, I pre- 
sume, that there was now no need to be so spar- 
ing in their use of shells, and they therefore took 
on a much more aggressive attitude. 

Turkish bombardments and trench "strafes" 
once more became the order of the day. Not to 
let the enemy have everything his own way, we 
ourselves arranged, late in October, to make a 
tremendous onslaught on the Turks. One of 
their trenches, known as H. 12, occupied a some- 
what commanding position and had been giving 
us a lot of trouble. It was decided, therefore, 
to batter it out of existence. 

Sharp to time, at three o'clock on a very 
"nippy" afternoon, a most terrific cannonade was 
opened on the doomed trench. Naval guns, 
French guns, British howitzers and field-pieces 
rained a devastating fire of high explosives and, 
as if this were not enough, three huge volcanoes 

[269] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

spurted out at three points of the trench, denot- 
ing that some great mines had been exploded. 
While the fire lasted, it was terrific, and the dust 
and smoke speedily hid all the Turkish trenches, 
as well as Krithia and Achi Baba, from our view. 
The infantry were then launched and the trench 
captured with very little loss. 

Trench warfare, dull as it is, for those who 
prefer a fight in the open, with a good horse 
under them, is yet not without its moments of 
fascination, and I often found myself in the thick 
of a trench "strafe" when I really had no busi- 
ness whatever to be in the neighbourhood. 

Gye, Rolo and I were returning from one of 
these trench fights in mid-October, when we our- 
selves nearly got "strafed" at Clapham Junction, 
a well-known spot behind the firing line on our 
right centre. Our mortars, borrowed from the 
French, had thoroughly annoyed the Turks and 
they retaliated by bombarding our trenches with 
shell-fire. We were pretty safe so long as we 
remained under cover, but on the way back to 
camp we caught it rather badly and only saved 
ourselves by our speedy flight over an exposed 
piece of ground which we had to cross, where the 
shells were falling pretty thickly. 

One of the most annoying things the Turks 

[270] 




BADGE OF THE ZION MULE CORPS (The Shield of Davki) 



THE SHIELD OF DAVID 

did was to mount a big naval gun "somewhere in 
Asia" not far from Troy — as distances go in 
Asia. This fiendish weapon had such a high 
velocity that the shell arrived on us before the 
report of the gun was heard. The sensation of 
hearing the shell screaming a few feet over one's 
head was most unpleasant, and we all looked for 
the moment that the big French guns in our lines 
would begin to shoot, as things were very dis- 
agreeable for us while "Helen" was in action. 
This gun was altogether so troublesome that we 
had christened it "Helen of Troy." 

Fortunately, only about one in four of its 
shells bm'st, otherwise we should have suffered 
very heavily, because many of them fell in and 
around our lines. My men would calmly pick 
up these unexploded shells and struggle off with 
them on their shoulders to adorn the entrance of 
their dug-outs ! This used to horrify the French 
gunners, who were close by and knew the danger 
of touching such dangerous toys. I am afraid 
my Zionists thought me somewhat of a tyrant for 
abolishing these aesthetic aids to the beautifica- 
tion of their subterranean homes ! 

Now and again, just as a reminder of the rig- 
ours to come, we were deluged by a downpour 
of rain, and then life in the trenches was almost 

[271] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

unbearable, for, owing to the subsoil being clay, 
all the water ran on the sui-face and speedily 
filled up every trench, dug-out and hollow; and 
this discomfort, coupled with mud, filth, too little 
food and sleep, and too much shells and bombs, 
made life in GallipoH more fit for a dog than a 
man. 

As the cold weather was coming on, I deter- 
mined to build a good stone house for my men, 
where there would always be a big fire going to 
keep them warm and to dry their clothes when 
they came back wet from the trenches. As it 
was not in our zone, I had to get the permission 
of the Chief Engineer of the French Army to 
take some stones from Sedd-el-Bahr village, be- 
cause it was only there that building material 
could be obtained. While we were pulling down 
a house and excavating the foundation, we dug 
up a slab of marble with a beautiful filigree de- 
sign carved round the outer edge of it, and in the 
centre, strange to say, was the Shield of David! 
The stone must have been very, very old, and 
how it got there is a mystery. Perhaps it may 
have been taken from Solomon's Temple in 
Jerusalem. 

My Zion men were delighted at the find and 
brought the stone in triumph to our camp, and it 

[272] 



THE SHIELD OF DAVID 

was kept in the new house as a tahsman to ward 
off the shells. Strange to say, although they fell 
all round, the building was never touched nor 
was any one injured in its vicinity. 

Our own dug-out was also gi-eatly improved 
when the weather became bitterly cold. We 
made the fireplace and chimney-stack out of old 
kerosene tins, which made a kind of brasier on 
which we burned charcoal obtained from the ref- 
use heap at the Field Bakery. Altogether, our 
dug-out was considered to be the cosiest one in 
the whole Peninsula, as indeed it had every right 
to be, for was not Claude Rolo, who was our 
architect and engineer, one of the cleverest civil 
engineers that ever passed through the Polji:ech- 
nic in Paris ? 

Our charcoal fire was very useful in many 
ways; it made very good toast, for the bread, 
which up to now had been excellent, began to 
be sodden owing to the bakery being in the open 
and, of course, getting the full benefit of all the 
rain that often came down in torrents; and in 
addition to the rain the unfortunate bakers were 
at all times under shell-fire. Although the bread 
was not up to the usual standard after the rains 
set in, yet in the whole history of war I do not be- 
lieve that men and animals have ever been better 

[273] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

fed than were the troops, horses and mules during 
the whole time we were on the Peninsula. The 
variety of food might perhaps have been bet- 
tered, but the qualitj'^ and quantity on the whole 
were excellent and reflected the greatest credit 
on the organisation of the Ai-my Service Corps; 
in fact, it was the only department where 
one could say all the time — it had done well. 
The Ordnance failed at times — failed lamentably 
in the supply of high explosives for the guns, but 
this was through no fault of the ordnance officer 
on the spot, who, I know, took every precaution 
to ask for every conceivable article months be- 
fore it was required. Of course, he did some- 
times get the needed articles, and sometimes, 
when it was on its way, submarines would sink 
the ship, or the ordnance people said the ship 
was sunk, which amounted to the same thing and 
covered a multitude of sins. Those submarines 
saved many reputations! All the sapper sup- 
plies, however, might just as well have been sunk, 
as it was impossible to get the smallest scrap of 
material, no matter how urgently required, with- 
out the most minute details as to what it was for 
and all about it. There was any amount of stuff 
one wanted in the Field Park, but when applica- 

[274] 



THE SHIELD OF DAVID 

tion was made for it the invariable reply was, 
"It is earmarked for other purposes." 

This policy is all very well in normal times, 
but does not do for war. Some men cannot 
shake off the petty trammels by which they are 
fettered in times of peace. 

I have no doubt the Turks much enjoyed the 
use of a considerable amount of this "ear- 
marked" material, which, if it had been issued 
to us, would have greatly enhanced the comfort 
of man and beast. 

I remember on one occasion being in want of 
a gallon of tar. Now there was any amount of 
it in the stores, in fact, one could see it oozing 
out of the barrels in all directions. I wanted 
this tar to put on some ropes and sacks filled 
with sand which I was burying in the ground to 
make my horse lines and to waterproof some 
canvas ; so I sent a man to the R. E. Park, with 
a requisition, hoping to get it back in the 
course of half an hour or so; but no: all he 
brought back was a letter to say: "Please ex- 
plain for what purpose you require this gallon of 
tar." I was so annoyed that I replied: "To 
make a bonfire when you get the order of the 
boot." But I have some doubt as to whether 

[275] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

this message ever reached its destination, as I 
had a very diplomatic adjutant. 

The officers and men of the corps of Royal 
Engineers who wore no red-tabs were simply 
splendid, and it was with admiration that I often 
watched them at all hours of the day and night, 
digging trenches, making saps, or putting up 
barbed wire, right in the very teeth of the enemy 
—''Second to None." 

It is sometimes of vital importance in war to 
do the exact contrary to all peace tradition; but 
men get into a groove, get narrow, and often fail 
to rise to the occasion. I have a good instance 
of this in mind. A certain officer refused to issue 
sandbags from his store when they were urgently 
needed. (This did not happen at Helles.) 
"They cost sixpence each," he remarked, "and I 
have got to be careful of them," — a wise precau- 
tion in peace-time, but utterly unsound in war, 
because a few sandbags at sixpence each might 
save the lives of several soldiers worth hundreds 
of pounds, putting it on merely a cash basis. 



[276] 



CHAPTER XXX 

BACK TO ENGLAND 

Shortly before I left Gallipoli our Staff ar- 
ranged what the American soldier would call a 
great "stunt." Materials for a huge bonfii-e 
were secretly collected and placed in a command- 
ing position after dark on the heights near the 
-<iEgean coast; near to it a mine was laid. At 
about ten o'clock at night this was purposely ex- 
ploded, making a terrific report; next moment, 
according to prearranged plan, the bonfire, 
which had been liberally saturated with oil and 
tar, bm'st into a great sheet of flame which lit 
up half our end of the Peninsula. Our Staff 
fully expected that the explosion followed by the 
great fire would bring every Turk out of the 
depths of his trench to the parapet in order to 
see what had happened ; so at this moment every 
gun on the Peninsula, which of course had the 
range of these Turkish trenches to a yard, loosed 
off a mighty salvo. Next morning at daylight 
the Staff eagerly scanned the enemy's parapets, 
expecting to see them littered with dead — but 

[277] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

instead they were somewhat chagrined to observe 
our old friend the Turkish wag slowly raise a 
great placard announcing: "No Casualties!" 

The Tm'ks were now much more lively in their 
cannonading, and began once more their hateful 
tactics of loosing off shells at mounted men. 

About a fortnight before I left the Peninsula, 
I was riding up from Gully Ravine, and, having 
got to the top of what is called Ai'tillery Road, 
I met a gun team, and one of the di'ivers told me 
to be careful going along the next couple of hun- 
dred yards, as the Turks were shelling the short 
strip of road just ahead. I was walking my 
horse at the time, and continued to do so, as I 
felt I was just as safe walking as galloping. In 
a few moments I heard the report of a gun from 
behind Krithia, then I heard the scream of a shell 
coming nearer and nearer, and as I bent my head 
down to the horse's mane I said to myself: 
"This is going to be a near thing." The shell 
whizzed close above my head and exploded a yard 
or two beyond me, plastering some twenty or 
thirty yards of ground with shrapnel. My 
horse took no notice of the explosion, and con- 
tinued walking on as if nothing had happened. 
Although I was anxiously on the look-out for 
another salute from the enemy, I thought, if I 

[278] 



BACK TO ENGLAND 

just walked on, I would bluff the Turkish ob- 
serving officer into thinking that, as I took the 
matter so unconcernedly, he must have the wrong 
range and it would be useless to go on shooting. 
It was either that or else he was a sportsman and 
thought that, as I had taken my escape so calmly, 
he would not shoot again, for at any rate not an- 
other round was fired. 

Although I did not know it at the time, Gye 
had been watching the whole of this episode from 
a little distance. He had seen the gun team be- 
ing shelled as it galloped for shelter down to the 
Gully, and when he saw me emerge he felt pretty 
sure that I would be fii-ed on as soon as I was 
spotted by the Turkish gunners. He told me 
it was most exciting to watch me as I came to 
the dangerous bit of road, hear the report of the 
Turkish gun, hear the shriek of the shell as it 
came along, and then see it go bang, apparently 
on my head! 

As was to be expected, where cannonading ard 
battles were the order of the day, there was little 
to be seen on the Peninsula in the way of animal 
or bird life. The cranes which Homer sings of 
somewhere or other, flew in great flocks down to 
Egypt, flying almost in the arrow formation of 
geese when in flight, but with the arrow not quite 

[279] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

so regular. I have put up some partridges out 
of the gorse, between the Gully Ravine and the 
^gean, within a hundred yards of where the 
guns were blazing away for all they were worth. 
There were a few other small birds about, but 
very few, if any, warblers. I came across one 
dead hare, shot by a stray bullet, and I had a 
glimpse of one live one as it scuttled away in 
the gorse. The only other four-footed wild 
thing that I saw in the Peninsula was what ap- 
peared to be a cross between the merecat and 
the mongoose, but slightly larger than the mon- 
goose. It was of a dark reddish-brown colour, 
thickly dotted over with grey spots. I saw one 
or two small snakes, but whether they were ven- 
omous or not I cannot say, for they glided off 
into their holes before I could secure a speci- 
men. 

A night or two before I left Gallipoli we had 
a sudden downpour of rain which made the 
trenches raging torrents, and turned the dug-outs 
into diving baths; but still our men remained 
cheery throughout it all; nothing can depress 
them. The men of L Battery, R. H. A., like all 
others, were flooded out in the twinkling of an 
eye, and I watched them, standing in their shirts 
on the edge of their dug-outs, endeavoring with 

[280] 



BACK TO ENGLAND 

a hooked stick to fish up their equipment and the 
remainder of their attire from a murky flood of 
water four feet deep — all the time singing gaily : 
"It's a long way to Tipperary." 

My escape on Artillery Road was the last 
serious little bit of adventure I had on the Penin- 
sula, for towards the end of November I got ill, 
and Captain Blandy, R. A. M. C, packed me off 
to hospital. My faithful orderly, Corporal Yor- 
ish, came with me to the hospital and saw that I 
was comfortably fixed up for the night. I can- 
not speak too highly of this man's behaviour dur- 
ing the whole time he was with me in Egypt and 
Gallipoli. In Palestine he was a dental student, 
but he could turn his hand to anything, and was 
never happy unless he was at work. 

I spent that night in the clearing station close 
to Lancashire Landing, on a bed having a big 
side tilt, with a dozen other officers all round, 
some sick, some wounded. We had a dim light 
from a hurricane lamp suspended to a rope, 
which was tied to the tent poles, and we got a 
little warmth and a lot of smell from an oil stove, 
for the weather was now very cold. 

At about 4 A. M. I dozed off, and the next 
thing I remember was a Turk leaning over me, 
trying, as I thought, to prod me in the face with 

[281] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

a bayonet. I made a vicious kick at him which 
woke me up, and then I discovered that my Turk 
was no Turk at all but merely the hospital or- 
derly, who was attempting to jab a thermometer 
into my mouth in an effort to take my tempera- 
ture. It was 5 A. M. and the hospital machine 
had begun to work, and whether you are well, 
or whether you are ill, or whether you are asleep, 
or whether you are awake, temperatures and 
medicines must be taken according to rule and 
regulation. 

This same clearing station had seen some very 
lively times, because it is close to the ordnance 
stores, and in a line from Asia to W Beach, 
so that shells used to fall into it both from Achi 
Baba and from across the Dardanelles. Order- 
lies and patients had been killed there, and many 
others had had marvellous escapes. Scores and 
scores of times have I witnessed the departure of 
the sick and wounded, which generally took place 
in the evening, and the clock-like precision with 
which everything worked reflected the greatest 
credit on Colonel Humphreys, R. A. M. C, who 
was in charge of it from the beginning to the 
end, and on the members of the R. A. M. C. Corps 
who assisted him. From what I saw of the 
R. A. M. C. men in Gallipoli, this Corps has every 

[282] 



BACK TO ENGLAND 

reason to be proud of itself. Of course, at the 
first landing there was a lamentable medical 
break-down, and there is no doubt that hundreds 
of lives were lost because there were not enough 
doctors, attendants, and stores to go round. 
Hundreds and hundreds of badly wounded men 
had to be stuffed anywhere on board transports 
and sent down to the hospitals at Alexandria 
with practically no one to look after them, ex- 
cepting their lesser wounded comrades; but this 
was an administrative blunder, which does not 
reflect on the pluck, energy and skill shown by 
all those R. A. M. C. officers and men with whom 
I came in contact in GalHpoli. 

Colonel Humphreys saw me off on the morn- 
ing of the 29th of November, and I went down in 
an ambulance full of officers and soldiers to the 
French pier at V Beach, the same at which I 
had landed in April, because our own pier at W 
Beach had been washed away and could not 
be used. While we were getting on board the 
trawler which was to take us to the hospital ship, 
the Turks put a few shells close round us in their 
efforts to damage the French works on V Beach. 
This was their last salute so far as I was con- 
cerned, for I never heard another shot fired. 
They were very good about our hospital ships, 

[283] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

and never attempted to do any shooting which 
would endanger them in any way. 

As we rounded the stern of the hospital ship 
in order to get to the lee-side, as the weather was 
a bit boisterous, I was interested to see that the 
ship was called the Assay e. 

Now during the South African War, I had 
gone out in this same ship in command of about 
twelve hundred troo23s, and it was somewhat odd 
that I should now see her as a hospital ship and 
be going aboard her as a patient. I found 
things very comfortable on board, and certainly 
it was an immense change to to us to find our- 
selves once more between sheets on a spring bed 
swung on pivots, so that the patients should not 
feel the motion of the ship. We were very 
democratic in the hospital, as generals, colonels, 
majors, captains, lieutenants and senior N. C. 
O.'s, some thirty or forty of us in all, were jum- 
bled up together in the ward. 

There was only one nursing sister for our 
ward, an Australian lady. Sister Dixon, who 
certainly worked like a slave from somewhere 
about seven in the morning until ten at night. 
Her task was too severe, and enough to break 
down any ordinary mortal. She was assisted in 
the ward duties by Corporal O'Brien, who did 

[284] 



BACK TO ENGLAND 

what he could to make us comfortable. The 
night orderly was a big kindly Scotch High- 
lander, named Mackinnon, almost as tender and 
sympathetic as a woman, who apologised pro- 
fusely when he had to wake us every morning at 
8 A. M. to take our temperatures and count the 
beats of our pulse. 

The Assay e lay off Cape Helles in a blind- 
ing blizzard of hail and snow, during which many 
of the poor fellows in the trenches were, I am 
told, frozen to death, or, as a lesser evil, got their 
feet frozen during that very cold spell. 

On the 27th we set sail for Mudros, which we 
reached in about four hours, where we lay at 
anchor for a day, and there was much specula- 
tion as to whether we would be transhipped, or 
go ashore and be put in hospital on this island, 
each and all wondering what was going to hap- 
pen. One or two light cases were put ashore, 
and then the ship weighed anchor bound for 
Alexandria, which we reached without adventure 
on the 1st of December. All of us who were 
unable to walk were carried ashore by some stal- 
wart Australians, and then we were sandwiched 
into a motor ambulance, still remaining on our 
stretchers, and driven off to Ras-el-Tin Hospital, 
which occupied an excellent position by the edge 

[285] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

of the sea. Here I spent fifteen days getting 
every care and attention from Miss Bond (the 
matron), and nursing sisters Blythe and Jordon, 
who looked after the patients in my ward. Ras- 
el-Tin Hospital is used for officers only, but I 
noticed that some of the medical officers were 
somewhat young and inexperienced. This I 
consider wrong, because in these days the lives 
of officers are of great importance, and only 
the best and most experienced medical officers 
should be employed to look after them, and 
get them fit for their duties as soon as possi- 
ble. 

My own little experience in this respect may 
not be out of place here as an apt illustration of 
what I have just written. 

The senior medical officer in charge, a very 
young temporary captain, without coming to 
see me, decreed that I was fit and well enough to 
leave the hospital for a convalescent home. 
Now, I was just about able to crawl and no more, 
and the matron and sister who knew the state I 
was in, told him that I was utterly unfit to leave 
the hospital. However, without coming to see 
me, he still remained obstinate, and ordered my 
kit away, but meanwhile. Colonel Beach, the 
A. D. M. S. Alexandria, having come to see me, 

[286] 



BACK TO ENGLAND 

his experienced eye showed him that it would be 
some months before I should be fit for military 
duty again, and he told me I should have to go 
before a medical board, who would dispose of 
my case. The following day the medical board 
decided to send me to England, and I was put 
on board the hospital ship Gurkha, which I 
found very comfortable, with excellent food and 
a most excellent medical staff, a colonel, three 
majors, and a captain, all of the Indian Medical 
Service; and I thought what a pity it was that 
some of these able and experienced officers could 
not be utilised to take charge of such hospitals as 
Ras-el-Tin, where they could guide the junior 
staff into the way they should go. It is just an- 
other example of not utihsing in the right way 
the wealth of talent which we possess in skilled 
and able men. I do not for a moment mean to 
suggest that the talents of these Indian Medical 
Service officers were wasted on the Gurkha. 
What I do mean is that one or two of the senior 
men would have been ample on the ship, with 
a couple of younger men as assistants, and the 
other senior men could then have been released 
for similar work among some of the ill-staffed 
hospitals in Egypt or Mesopotamia. 

Colonel Haig, I. M. S., the senior medical of- 

[287] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

ficer on board, was untiring in his care of the sick 
and wounded, and if a testimonial of his zeal 
were wanted, it could be found in the difference 
in the appearance which his three hundred pa- 
tients presented from the day when they came 
on board the Gurkha at Alexandria to the day 
when they left his hands at Southampton. I, 
who saw it, can onty say it was simply marvel- 
lous. 

After eleven daj^s' treatment in the capable 
hands of Major Houston, I. M. S., I found my- 
self a different man when I walked off the ship 
at Southampton, where we arrived on Boxing 
Day, 1915, and reached London on a hospital 
train the same evening. At Waterloo we were 
met by a medical officer, who scattered us 
throughout the hospitals in London. I was for- 
tunate in being sent to that organised by Lady 
Violet Brassey at 40, Upper Grosvenor Street, 
where I was never so comfortable, or so well 
cared for in the whole course of my life, and for 
which I tender her my very sincere thanks; and 
I would also like to thank Doctor A. B. Howitt, 
Miss Spencer (the matron), and the sisters and 
nurses for the care and kindness which they 
showed me during the three weeks I was in their 
charge. 

[288] 



BACK TO ENGLAND 

It was delightful to have old friends crowding 
in with gifts of flowers, and fruit, and books, and 
all the latest London papers and gossip. Lady 
Violet arranged some delightful concerts for us 
at which such public favourites as IMadame 
Bertha Moore, Miss Evie Greene and others 
charmed us with song, story, and recitation. 
Among the "others" was Miss Marjorie Moore, 
whose song, "Just a Little Bit of Heaven," 
reached all the Irish hearts there. 

Harry Irving, too, came to see me one day, 
and presented me with a box for the Savoy, 
where half a dozen of us thoroughly enjoyed 
The Case of Lady Camber. 

Discussing the play at dinner in the hospital 
afterwards, I remarked how well Holman Clarke 
had acted in the Sherry scene, when the V. A. D. 
nm'se who was at that moment handing me some 
soup remarked: "I am glad j^ou liked him, be- 
cause he is my brother." 

How wonderfully well the women of the Em- 
pire have shown up during the war! They have 
come forward in their thousands, not only for 
V. A. D. work, where their help is invaluable, 
but also for munition work and work of every 
kind, which up to the outbreak of war it was 
thought could only be done by men. 

[289] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

Yes, the women have certainly come into their 
own, and I for one am very glad of it, and proud 
too of the fact that they have responded so nobly 
to the call. 



[290] 



CHAPTER XXXI 

THE EVACUATION 

When I learned in August of the Great Failure 
at Suvla, and heard with astonishment and no 
little anger that no further troops were to be 
sent to Galhpoli, I knew then that the only thing 
to do was to get out as quickly as possible be- 
fore the Turks could get a fresh stock of muni- 
tions and reinforcements from Germany and 
Bulgaria. 

It must not be imagined that I was anxious 
that we should leave Gallipoli after all our great 
sacrifices there, but since the Government had 
decided once more to fritter away our chances 
by divertmg troops to Salonika, when it was al- 
ready too late to accomplish any useful purpose 
there, I knew that our position on the Peninsula 
was hopeless. 

Bad weather was coming on uid it would have 
been absolutely impossible to live in the trenches 
and dug-outs. Even with the httle amount of 
rain that I had experienced, the communication 
and other trenches were at times waist deep in 

[291] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

raging torrents, carrying down empty cases, dead 
Turks and other debris. 

Had troops been left in Gallipoli for the win- 
ter, the losses from sickness and exposure alone 
would have been enormous; in fact, the Ai'my 
would have needed renewing every month. 

It must be remembered that the conditions of 
life in Gallipoli were entirely different to those 
prevailing in France. There were no such 
things as dry sleeping places, dry clothes, or 
housing of any kind, and one was just as likely 
to be killed in the so-called rest trenches as in 
those on the front line. 

One of the saddest things I know of was the 
death of the Colonel commanding the King's 
Own Scottish Borderers. He had escaped every- 
thing right through the campaign, but in the end 
met his death in one of the rest trenches about 
the middle of November, by a shell fii'ed from 
"Helen of Troy" on the Asiatic coast. 

When once it was definitely decided to send 
no further reinforcements to GalHpoli, of course 
the only thing left to do was to get out, and to 
get out as speedily as possible. 

But even after the obvious had become inevi- 
table, we still went on gaily, spending enormous 
sums of money, laying down miles of tramways, 

[292] 



THE EVACUATION 

making roads, bridges, erecting camp hospitals, 
and doing a thousand other things — all very ex- 
pensive work. 

When I saw this going on I began to think 
that perhaps, after all, the Government were 
really going to do the right thing, which would 
have been to throw an overwhelming force of 
Anglo-French troops on the Turks, catching 
them, as they then were, with but little ammuni- 
tion, crumpling them up and thus accomplishing 
our main object in the Near East. This would, 
undoubtedly, have been the right line of policy to 
have taken, and would have helped Serbia much 
more than anything else, but some fatal demon 
seems to dog the footsteps of our politico-strate- 
gists. 

When our Foreign Minister declared that we 
were going to uphold Serbia with all our might 
he must have known that he was mouthing mere 
empty phrases, but the unfortunate Serbians put 
their trust in the pledged word of a British Min- 
ister, with the result that thousands upon thou- 
sands of them have been cruelly done to death. 

The more honest and more noble plan would 
have been to have admitted that, at the moment, 
we could do nothing for Serbia or the Serbians, 
and to have advised them to make what terms 

[293] 



WITH THE ZIONISTS IN GALLIPOLI 

they could with their powerful neighbour, assur- 
ing them that, at the right time, when we were 
ready, we would, without fail, not only deliver 
them from the hands of their enemies, but amply 
compensate them for the trials they would, for a 
space, have to endm^e. 

It is said that the gods strike with blindness 
those whom they are about to destroy and it cer- 
tainly looks as if the gods had held the searing 
iron rather close to our eyes; but, notwithstand- 
ing all the mistakes and in spite of our politicians 
and our blundering strategists, and in spite of 
our neglect of science and scientists, I have still 
absolute confidence, owing to what I have seen 
of the splendid pluck and endurance of our men, 
both in the Fleet and in the Army, that we will 
come out of this great World War triumphant. 

Let it not be supposed that our terrible losses 
and disastrous failure in the Dardanelles have 
been altogether fruitless. By our presence there, 
we held up and almost destroyed a magnificent 
Turkish Army and by doing this we gave in- 
valuable aid to our Russian ally. 

Had it been possible for the Turkish Army, 
which we held fast in Gallipoli, to have taken 
part in Enver Pasha's great push in the Cau- 
casus, there is no doubt that the Turks would 

[294] 



THE EVACUATION 

have crushed the Russians in those regions and 
have made things look verj'^ black indeed for our 
ally. As it is, I consider it is greatly due to the 
Gallipoli campaign that Russia, during her time 
of stress and shortage of munitions, was able to 
hold her own in the Caucasus and, when she was 
ready, assume the offensive, resulting in her re- 
cent brilliant capture of that great Turkish 
stronghold in Asia Minor, Erzeroum. 

The knowledge that this effort of ours has, 
after all, borne some fruit tends to assuage our 
grief for the loss of those dear friends and good 
comrades who now He buried by those purple 
^gean shores. 

We can well imagine that the spirits of those 
heroes of France and Britain and Greater Brit- 
ain who have fallen in the fight are eagerly 
watching and waiting for the hour of our victory ; 
and when our Fleet sails triumphantly through 
the Dardanelles, as it surely must, and thunders 
forth a salute over the mortal remains of our 
mighty dead, their shades will be at peace, for 
they will then know that, after all, they have not 
died in vain. 



[295] 



APPENDIX 

I HAD no idea when I was taken to Hospital that 
I should not see my Zion men again. I thought 
I should be fit for duty in the course of a few 
days, so I never even said good-bye to them be- 
fore I left. However, I am in touch with them 
still through the post, and I am glad to say that 
there were no deaths after I left and all got 
safely back to Eg^^pt when that brilliant piece 
of work — the evacuation of Gallipoli — took 
place. I promised to recommend those who did 
well to the Russian Authorities, and I was glad 
to forward the following letter and list of names 
to the Imperial Russian Consul at Alexandria, 
for transmission to the proper quarter: 

Headquarters, Zion Mule Corps, 

14* Rue Sesostris, Alexandria, 

December 14!th, 1915. 
From the OflScer Commanding 
Zion Mule Corps. 

To • 

The Imperial Russian Consul, 
Alexandria. 
Sir, 

I have the honour to state that with the approval of 

[297] 



APPENDIX 

your Government a number of Jewish refugees from 
Palestine, Russian subjects, were formed into a corps 
for service with the British Army. I have already fur- 
nished you with a nominal roll of all officers and men 
of Russian nationality in the Corps. I now wish to 
bring to your notice, for the favourable consideration 
of your Government, the names of those soldiers who 
did especially well while serving under my command in 
Gallipoli, and I sincerely trust that you may find it 
possible to have their names brought before the Im- 
perial Russian Minister for War for favourable con- 
sideration. 

The following have distinguished themselves before 
the enemy : 

Officers : 

1. Captain J. Trumpledor has proved himself a most 
gallant soldier and has been already decorated by 
H. I. M. the Tsar for gallantry at Port Arthur. 

2. Second Lieutenant Alexander Gorodisky. This 
was one of my best officers and he was a very brave 
soldier. I was much grieved when he died as the result 
of the hardships of the campaign. He leaves a wid- 
owed mother who was dependent on him for her main- 
tenance. 

3. Second Lieutenant Zolman Zlotnic, a useful officer 
and a gallant man. 

NON-COMMISSIONED OFFICERS : 

1. Sergeant-Ma j or Joseph Yassinsky. 

S. Sergeant Nissel Rosenberg. 

3. Corporal M. Groushkovsky. This Corporal has 
been awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal for gal- 
lantry in the field. 

[298] 



APPENDIX 

4. Corporal Nehmia Yehoudis. 

5. Corporal Isaac Yorish. 

G. Corporal Frank Abram (killed in action, leaving 
a widow and five little children). 

I have only mentioned those who have specially dis- 
tinguished themselves, many others did very good serv- 
ice also, and I am glad to be able to attach a copy of 
an official letter, enclosed herewith, testifying to the 
good work done by these Russian subjects while serving 
under me in the British Army. 

Trusting for the favour of your transmitting these 
names to the proper quarter. 

I remain. 

Sir, 
Your most obedient servant, 
(Signed) J. H. Patterson. 

Lieutenant-Colonel Commanding Zion Mule Corps. 

[copy.] 

8th Army Corps, H. Q. D. Adjt.-General, G. H. Q. 
No. 274/12. No. B. 3322, 

October 2nd, 1915. 5/10/15. 

M. E. F. 
The A. Q. M. G. 8th Army Corps. 

I have had a petition from forty-five N. C. O.'s and 
men of this corps for permission to go to Alexandria 
for a couple of weeks on leave. I would very strongly 
recommend that this leave may be granted, as these 
N. C. O.'s and men have been here (and have worked 
well) ever since the original landing in April. 

I consider that the men really need this change and 
as their families are in Alexandria, I hope they will be 
sent there in accordance with their request. 

[299] 



APPENDIX 

If, as I hope, my men are given leave to proceed to 
Alexandria, I propose to give one half leave as soon as 
granted, and the other half on the return of the first 
party. 

As these men have done particularly well, I trust 
that their good service will be recognised. 

J. H. Patterson, 
Lieutenant-Colonel, Commanding. 
2/10/15. 
(Zion Mule Corps) 



2. Adjutant-General, G. H. Q. 8th Corps, H. Q. 

No. B. 332. No. A. 274/12. 

5/10/15 4/10/15 

M. E. F. 
G. H. Q. 

I recommend this application. As the G. O. C-in-C. 
is aware this Corps has done excellent work. 

(Signed) Francis Davies, 

Lieutenant General, 
4/10/15. Cemmanding 8th Corps. 



3. G. O. C. 8th Corps. 

This leave is approved, the delay is greatly regretted, 
but has been unavoidable. The C.-in-C. has approved 
of a grant of one pound to each of these forty-five men 
in consideration of the good •work of the Corps, and the 
Field Cashier is authorised to issue the cash. 

(Signed) A. Cavendish, 

Colonel, 
6/11/15. A. A. G., G. H. Q. 

[300] 



APPENDIX 

4. Field Cashier. 

Please note, and pass to O. C. ZIon Mule Corps, who 
should return this memo to Corps Headquarters. 
(Signed) C. D. Hamilton Moore, 
Lieutenant-Colonel for B. G., D. A. 
and Q. M. G. 8th Army Corps. 
7/10/15. 



THE END 



[301] 



HATIKVOH 

(Song of Hope) 



HATIKVOH 

Kol owd Hallivor peneemoh 
Nafesch Yehoodee howmeeoh 
Ulefahahsi Mizroch kohdeemoh 
Aynec Tzeeown tsowfeeoh. 

Owd lou ovdoh Sikvohsinu 
Hatikvoh hahnowshohno. 
Loshur learetz ahvousinu 
Leear bow Dovid chonoh. 

Kol owd demohows — INIieyeninu 
Yizzlu keghashem nedovous 
Urvovous mibni Amminu 
Owd howlcheem al kivri ovous. 

Owd lou ovdoh Sikvohsinu 
Hatikvoh hahnowshohno. 
Loshur learetz ahvousinu 
Leear bow Dovid chonoh. 



[304] 



HATIKVOH 

( THE SONG OF HOPE ) 



Arranged by Eva Lonsdalh. 




1. O, Zi - on, our fair dwell-ing, home of peace and rest, 

2. Tho' dark and drear, the hours pass slow, and fraught with pain. 



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Far from thee we mourn our lib - er - ty, Tho' 
Still we trust, Thoul't cher - ish us once more For 




By kind permission of Messrs. R. Mazin & Co., London. 
[305] 



HATIKVOH 




sadden'd be our hearts, our souls with grief oppress'd, 
soon the dawn must break o'er thy green hills a - gain. 




Still our hope, our hope is in thee. 
Bring - ing joy to thy fair shore. 



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Oh, Lord our God, guard and set us free — 



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Grant to Zi - on joy and lib - er - ty. 



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[306] 



THE SONG OF HOPE 




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molto rail. 



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more, dear land, re - stor - ed to thee. 



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[307] 



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